Art

South African Play Explores Impact of Historic Xhosa Prophetess Nongqawuse

Navdeep Jassal, has been traveling in South Africa for the last five months and recently had the opportunity to review a play in Johannesburg. Presented by Africa Creations Production Company, the play reveals the nature of African indigenous spirituality. “The Rise and Fall of the African Gospel: Nongqawuse” was created, written and directed by Mbongeni Moroke who was inspired by the historic events of 1856-7 and the miseducation that followed.

Published

2 years ago

March 6, 2023

Oakland Post

Nongqawuse. Wikipedia image and Tiyo Soga. Wikipedia image

By Navdeep Jassal
Post News Group Contributor

“The Rise and Fall of the African Gospel: Nongqawuse” was created, written and directed by Mbongeni Moroke who was inspired by the historic events of 1856-7 and the miseducation that followed.

Though performed in the Xhosa language, with a few short excerpts in English for non-Xhosa speakers, I had the opportunity to speak with Moroke — who portrayed Mhlakaza, a sangoma (traditional healer) and father to Nongqawuse. This article is gleaned from our conversations.

The play is about two well-known historical figures for the Xhosa: Their young maiden prophetess, Nongqawuse, and South Africa’s first Black Christian Presbyterian minister, Tiyo Soga.

For background’s sake, it must be understood that according to African indigenous spirituality, cows are slaughtered to summon the ancestors’ protection. In 1856, cattle represented the primary measure of wealth among the Xhosa, and the word to the king from prophetess Nongqawuse that cattle should be killed to hide the wealth from the arriving Christian missionaries was shocking.

The message came in a time when the Xhosa nations’ strength and trust in its leadership had been eroding after a great king had been assassinated by Christian missionaries in the early 1800s following his betrayal by his own counsel and other Xhosa leaders.

That “negative aura persisted around the kings,” making for a continual threat to Xhosa unity, Moroke said.

And unity is key: According to South African spirituality, God the Creator cannot intervene in a divided nation; therefore, after the slaughter, the rising of the ancestors foreseen by Nongqawuse did not happen in the way it was expected.

Enter Tiyo Soga, the son of a chief counselor to the king who had turned away from Xhosa tradition and followed in his Christian mother’s footsteps. He eventually traveled to Scotland to study religion and theology and returned as a Christian evangelist.

By then, Xhosa society was divided like never before. The Christian missions became the sanctuary and refuge for the hordes of hungry, famished people — their grain silos empty, their cattle no more, and their land useless.

While 16-year-old Nongqawuse was labeled a false prophet and scapegoated, Soga and lesser-known Black individuals spread the new religion by white Christian missionaries throughout Xhosa land.

Moroke’s inspiration is a righteous one: The spirit of God the Creator existed before the Bible in

Africa and Moroke speaks from and uses the African indigenous spiritual lens in his work as playwright, director, actor, and musician, demonstrating that spirituality in ancient Africa was powerful.

Through entertainment, Moroke strives to re-educate Black South Africans on the value of their own history, valor and spirituality.

The opening scene takes place on Robben Island more than 100 years before Nelson Rolihlahla Mandela was a political prisoner there. Three broken Xhosa kings shed tears as white Christian missionaries locked them up, thus destroying their ability to provide spiritual guidance to their tribesmen and women.

In his signature style, the first scene becomes the final scene as well, but for nearly two hours, Moroke takes the audience through the events that led to the kings’ capture.

“There are three things which control the world: economics, politics and religion,” said Moroke. “When a nation is ruling well within these three sectors, that nation becomes the most powerful nation in the world. So, white Christian missionaries took charge in Africa in these three sectors and used religion through the Bible to destroy and rule us.

“Every generation has its mandate and the last generation had politics as its mandate,” Moroke said. “As someone representing the current generation, the mandate is to revisit indigenous and spiritual history and go back to the core problems which led to apartheid. I am trying to answer a question of this generation in terms of what went wrong, and why are we here after all the struggles and voting in 1994.”

Although I could not piece it all together due to language barriers and lack of context, as I sat in the audience, I knew what I was watching was very moving and powerful.

There were some audience members crying because the play resonated with their backgrounds as African people. And, for others, the play resonated in terms of family whether it was family disfunction or affection.

Two Xhosa people said that when the ‘king’ was coming onto the stage, they had a vision of that actual king coming. Another sangoma said she learned many things from Moroke’s character about the discipline of a sangoma.

For more information direct message Africa Creations on social media: Facebook Africa-Creations; Instagram @africa_creations; Twitter @Afric_Creations; or email africacreationsmail@gmail.com and watch YouTube videos @africacreations8130.

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Brown University Professor and Media Artist Tony Cokes Among MacArthur Awardees

When grants were announced earlier this month, it was noted that seven of the 22 fellows were African American. Among them are scholars, visual and media artists a poet/writer, historian, and dancer/choreographer who each receive $800,000 over a five-year period to spend as they see fit. Their names are Ruha Benjamin, Jericho Brown, Tony Cokes, Jennifer L. Morgan, Ebony G. Patterson, Shamel Pitts, Jason Reynolds, and Dorothy Roberts. This is the third in the series highlighting the Black awardees.

Published

4 weeks ago

November 4, 2024

Oakland Post

Tony Cokes. Photo courtesy of the John D. and Catherine T. MacArthur Foundation

Special to The Post

Tony Cokes

Tony Cokes, 68, is a media artist creating video works that recontextualize historical and cultural moments. Cokes’s signature style is deceptively simple: changing frames of text against backgrounds of solid bright colors or images, accompanied by musical soundtracks.

Cokes was born in Richmond, Va., and received a BA in creative writing and photography from Goddard College in 1979 and an MFA from Virginia Commonwealth University in 1985. He joined the faculty of Brown University in 1993 and is currently a professor in the Department of Modern Culture and Media.

According to Wikipedia, Cokes and Renee Cox, and Fo Wilson, created the Negro Art Collective (NAC) in 1995 to fight cultural misrepresentations about Black Americans.^[^5]

His work has been exhibited at national and international venues, including Haus Der Kunst and Kunstverein (Munich); Dia Bridgehampton (New York); Memorial Art Gallery University of Rochester; MACRO Contemporary Art Museum (Rome); and the Carpenter Center for the Visual Arts (Harvard University), among others.

Like a DJ, he samples and recombines textual, musical, and visual fragments. His source materials include found film footage, pop music, journalism, philosophy texts, and social media. The unexpected juxtapositions in his works highlight the ways in which dominant narratives emerging from our oversaturated media environments reinforce existing power structures.

In his early video piece Black Celebration (A Rebellion Against the Commodity) (1988), Cokes reconsiders the uprisings that took place in Black neighborhoods in Los Angeles, Detroit, Newark, and Boston in the 1960s.

He combines documentary footage of the upheavals with samples of texts by the cultural theorist Guy Debord, the artist Barbara Kruger, and the musicians Morrisey and Martin Gore (of Depeche Mode).

Music from industrial rock band Skinny Puppy accompanies the imagery. In this new context, the scenes of unrest take on new possibilities of meaning: the so-called race riots are recast as the frustrated responses of communities that endure poverty perpetuated by structural racism. In his later and ongoing “Evil” series, Cokes responds to the rhetoric of the Bush administration’s “War on Terror.”

Evil.16 (Torture.Musik) (2009–11) features snippets of text from a 2005 article on advanced torture techniques. The text flashes on screens to the rhythm of songs that were used by U.S. troops as a form of torture.

The soundtrack includes Metallica’s “Enter Sandman” and Britney Spears’s “… Baby One More Time,” songs known to have been played to detainees at deafening decibel levels and on repeated loops. The dissonance between the instantly recognizable, frivolous music and horrifying accounts of torture underscores the ideological tensions within contemporary pop culture.

More recently, in a 2020 work entitled HS LST WRDS, Cokes uses his pared-down aesthetic to examine the current discourse on police violence against Black and Brown individuals. The piece is constructed around the final words of Elijah McClain, who was killed in the custody of Colorado police. Cokes transcribes McClain’s last utterances without vowels and sets them against a monochromatic ground. As in many of Cokes’s works, the text is more than language conveying information and becomes a visualization of terrifying breathlessness. Through his unique melding of artistic practice and media analysis, Cokes shows the discordant ways media color our understanding and demonstrates the artist’s power to bring clarity and nuance to how we see events, people, and histories.

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A Prolific Painter: Artist and Advocate Lois Mailou Jones

Lois Mailou Jones was a prominent African American artist whose career spanned more than seven decades, from the Harlem Renaissance to the modern art movement. She was not only a prolific painter but also an influential educator, bridging cultural gaps and challenging stereotypes through her vibrant and diverse works.

Published

1 month ago

October 29, 2024

Oakland Post

Courtesy of National Archives, Washington, D.C.

By Tamara Shiloh

Her unique journey of self-expression, dedication to art, and advocacy for African American and African themes made her a crucial figure in the evolution of American art.

Jones was born on Nov. 3, 1905, in Boston. Raised in an intellectual and supportive family, she demonstrated an early interest in art, encouraged by her mother, who believed in the importance of creativity. Lois studied at the School of the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston, where she faced racial challenges but persisted in pursuing her passion.

Her pursuit of higher education led her to the prestigious Design Art School, where she perfected her skills in textile design. Later, Jones attended Harvard University and received further training at the Académie Julian in Paris. This European experience greatly influenced her style and broadened her perspective on art.

Jones’s career began in textile design, creating works that were used by leading textile companies. However, her true passion was painting. During the Harlem Renaissance, she moved away from textile design to focus on fine art, exploring themes that reflected her heritage and the African diaspora.

Her early works were influenced by European Post-Impressionism, featuring landscapes and still life, but Jones’s style evolved over time. After spending time in Haiti, she was deeply inspired by Caribbean culture, and her palette became more vivid, her subject matter more symbolic. The influence of African and Caribbean culture is evident in her later works, where she used bright colors and geometric patterns to convey the spirit and stories of the people she encountered.

Her contributions to African American art were significant during a time when Black artists struggled for recognition. She often focused on themes of African heritage, pride, and unity, blending African illustrations and portraits with Western artistic techniques to create a unique visual language that celebrated Black culture.

She was also a dedicated educator. She began her teaching career at Palmer Memorial Institute in North Carolina and later became a professor at Howard University in Washington, D.C., where she taught for almost 50 years. Through her teaching, she influenced generations of young Black artists, encouraging them to explore and express their cultural heritage through art.

In the 1930s and 1940s, she worked to exhibit her work alongside other Black artists, helping to create a platform for voices that had long been excluded from mainstream galleries.

Recognition and Legacy

Jones achieved significant recognition throughout her lifetime, both in the United States and internationally. She exhibited her work across the globe, including in Paris, Africa, and the Caribbean.

Jones continued painting until her death in 1998, leaving behind a rich legacy of artistic achievements and contributions to art education. She broke boundaries by celebrating Black identity and heritage at a time when these themes were often marginalized.

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At Oakland Symphony’s 2024-25 Season Opening, Music Director Kedrick Armstrong Will Make History

Music Director Kedrick Armstrong will make history with his debut performance at the Oakland Symphony’s 2024-25 Season Opening Concert on Oct. 18, at 8 p.m. at the Paramount Theatre in Oakland. Armstrong, who is from Georgetown, South Carolina, is the ninth music director in the organization’s almost 100-year-history. His appointment follows in the footsteps of the late Oakland Symphony Music Director and Conductor Michael Morgan.

Published

1 month ago

October 22, 2024

Oakland Post

Music Director Kedrick Armstrong. Photo by Scott Chernis.

By Oakland Post Staff

Music Director Kedrick Armstrong will make history with his debut performance at the Oakland Symphony’s 2024-25 Season Opening Concert on Oct. 18, at 8 p.m. at the Paramount Theatre in Oakland.

Armstrong, who is from Georgetown, South Carolina, is the ninth music director in the organization’s almost 100-year-history. His appointment follows in the footsteps of the late Oakland Symphony Music Director and Conductor Michael Morgan.

Armstrong, 30, is not a new face to Oakland as he has been an active partner with the Oakland Symphony over the last few years both on and off-the-stage.

From 2022-24, Armstrong led three Oakland Symphony programs and guest-conducted the orchestra, showcasing his broad knowledge of the classical repertoire and enthusiasm for spotlighting diverse voices.

On his Oakland Symphony subscription debut on Feb. 16, Kedrick led the World Premiere of “Here I Stand: Paul Robeson,” an oratorio by Carlos Simon on a libretto by Dan Harder, commissioned by the Oakland Symphony.

On April 16, 2023, Armstrong conducted the Oakland Symphony’s Family Hype concert, presented in partnership with Ronald McDonald House Charities of the Bay Area. Armstrong first led the orchestra for a free “Summerstage at City Hall” concert at Oakland City Hall on Aug. 4, 2022.

The music program “Kedrick Armstrong Inaugural Inextinguishable Oakland!” will include commissioned works from master drummer Allison Miller and Bay Area artists – Ethiopian artist Meklit and Latin percussionist John Santos – in celebration of Living Jazz’s 40th anniversary.

Oct. 18 musical program:

Julia Perry: A Short Piece for Orchestra

Celebrate the 40-Year Anniversary of Living Jazz with three jazz-rooted compositions.

“Valley of the Giants” (for Eddie Marshall); Allison Miller, composer; arranged and orchestrated by Todd Sickafoose. Featured artist: Allison Miller, Drum Set; guest artist: Dayna Stephens, Saxophone.

Medley: “Ethio Blue, My Gold, Stars in a Wide Field”

Songs and Lyrics by Meklit; arrangement and orchestration by Sam Bevan. Featured artist: Meklit, Vocals; guest artists: Sam Bevan, Bass, Colin Douglas, Drumkit, Marco Peris Coppola, Tupan/Percussion.

“Un Levantamiento (An Uprising)”

Composer, percussion: John Santos; arrangers: Saul Sierra and John Santos. Featured artist: John Santos, güícharo, bongo; guest artists: Pedro Pastrana, Puerto Rican cuatro; Maria Cora, spoken word.

Carl Nielsen: Symphony No. 4, “The Inextinguishable”

Pre-concert talk by John Kendall Bailey begins at 7:05pm.

For tickets, go to: https://oaklandsymphony.my.salesforce-sites.com/ticket/#/events/a0SUu0000001rYXMAY