I have a school friend called Carol who has lived out of the country since the mid 1970s but has returned often since the 1990s. Recently her mother died. She had been living at a frail care facility down on the southern Cape coast and had been looked after with loving gentleness by wonderful care-givers. [...]

A bronze sculpture of a lone man seated on a chair and holding his precious saxophone, was unveiled on 25th September.  
Located outside the ‘original’ Kippies Jazz club in Newtown, and designed by Guy Du Toit and Egon Tania, a second empty chair encourages the spectator to sit next to the figure of Kippie Morolong Moeketsi [...]

Project 2010 [Issue 157] reports: ‘National Arts Festival organisers are in the throes of putting together a massive programme to coincide with the 2010 World Cup. The Herald reports that the 2010 festival in Grahamstown has been extended to 15 days from the normal 10 and the hopes are that soccer fans will pour into [...]

Don’t miss the major retrospective exhibition of Alexis Preller’s work which opened last night at the Standard Bank Gallery in Joburg CBD. Attended by several hundred people, the exhibition was opened by Esme Berman, well-known researcher on South African art, who co-curated the exhibition with Karel Nel (artist, curator, collector and teacher).  Some 60 works construct an historical [...]

A superb Johannesburg exhibition ends on Saturday 10th October. If you are local get there if you can. If you are an international traveler, contact Sally Thompson of The Thompson Gallery in Melville (info@thompsonsgallery.co.za  or phone on 011-482-2039) for access to Sally Gaule’s photographs of Johannesburg.   The Jo’burg Gini takes its title from the Gini coefficient [...]

Alexandra Township, commonly known as Alex is a mere 4 km from the heart of the wealthy CBD of Sandton. Home to some 350-400,000 people it covers an area of about 28 square km. (Compare this to Soweto’s +/- 150 sq kms and ca 1.7 million people.) Present day Alex is divided roughly into 3 [...]

I have had the privilege of being provided with beautifully handcrafted cloths, intricately decorated with beads and safety pins to sell to guests.  Through a guest staying here at the guest house I met up again with  Mbhanyele Jameson Maluleke, whom I had first met whilst I was still at Wits.  Mbhanyele Jameson runs a group project [...]

Kim Miller, assistant professor of women’s studies and art history at Wheaton College in the States, is currently researching visual representations of women political activists in South Africa both during and after the struggle against apartheid.  When in Johannesburg on her research trips, Kim stays at Liz at Lancaster Guest House.  Wanting to track down [...]

Kim Sacks, who is a potter, a teacher, a facilitator and much more besides, has developed a gallery which sells a range of exquisite artefacts. These range from historical to contemporary, and include functional objects used in a traditional context (milk gourds, head rests, stools, sticks, clothing regalia, etc.) and objects like pottery and artwork [...]

Janine Hobbs from Cotswold Gardens, an excellent 4 star guest house in Saxonwold , sent me this wonderful oh so South African story:
Janine writes:
Yesterday I took a trip to Nasrec to work out the exact kilometres from my place to Soccer City.  Well this mlungu [white person] took the wrong turn off and got so lost [...]