kagablog

March 19, 2010

afrikaaps

Filed under: catherine henegan, afrikaaps — ABRAXAS @ 6:01 am

Straight from its world premiere at the Klein Karoo National Arts Festival (KKNK) in Oudtshoorn, the cutting-edge hiphopera Afrikaaps is coming to the Baxter Theatre. It will be playing from 7 to 23 April at 20:00 nightly.

Director, Catherine Henegan, has assembled a formidable ensemble of young guns and an equally impressive creative team to help trace the origins of Afrikaans all the way back to the 1600s and follow its evolution through to the present day.

The line-up features hip-hop poet, performer and musician, Jitsvinger; composer, pianist and jazz prodigy, Kyle Shepherd; singer and poet, Blaq Pearl; hip-hop artist and activist, Emile Jansen; bassist and musician, Shane Cooper; singer, actor and dancer, Moenier Adams; rapper and break-dancer, Bliksemstraal; and poet and storyteller, Jethro Louw of the Khoi Khonnexion.

Set in a dynamic digital landscape, the ensemble, Die Argitekbekke, represents an eclectic fusion of musical genres. In true hip-hop mode this musical theatre piece employs glitches; scratches; beats; and rhymes to traverse time, while also referencing the multiplicity of traditional Cape styles like Ghoema and Kaapse Klopse.

South African-born Henegan once again teams up with film maker; director; poet; novelist; musician; and blogger, Aryan Kaganof, who takes on the role of dramaturg for this production. The two last worked together in South Africa on The Shooting Gallery, which was presented at The Market Theatre and at the National Arts Festival, Grahamstown. Documentary film maker, Dylan Valley, is responsible for the video and for documenting the process with lighting by top international lighting designer, Jantje Geldof.

Afrikaaps is an international collaboration between the Baxter Theatre Centre and The Glasshouse Theatre Collective in Amsterdam, in association with ABSA KKNK, with additional support from the Performing Arts Fund of Netherlands; City of Amsterdam; and Theatre Institute of the Netherlands.

Henegan is Co-founder of The Glasshouse, a multi-disciplinary theatre collective based in Amsterdam. She made her debut as a director in South Africa in 2006 with the controversial media performance of The Shooting Gallery about a war photographer with a moral dilemma.

“With this collaboration I am excited to be bringing together artists from different disciplines made up of musicians; performers; and film makers for this theatrical event,” says Henegan.

This theatre production is part of a bigger movement of efforts to reclaim the Afrikaans language for all who speak it. There is a side to the language - the Creole birth of the language - that has been overlooked in South Africa’s collective consciousness. The role of indigenous cultures and the slave population in forging the language has generally been excluded from the history books. The Afrikaans hip-hop movement in the Cape, through voices like Jitsvinger; Blaq Pearl; and Emile Jansen, is fueled by celebrating and reclaiming indigenous cultural heritage, and defining and re-defining who the Afrikaners of the 21st century are.

The makers of Afrikaaps set out on a mission of investigation and redefinition combining storytelling; poetry; music; and video to trace the evolution and roots of Afrikaans. As Dylan Valley, who is making the video component of the production, has pointed out, “We need to recognise Afrikaans as part of the heritage of all South Africans, and not only of one particular racial group. Together we can make Afrikaans a language of liberation! ”

Afrikaaps runs at the Klein Karoo National Arts Festival from 1 to 4 April and then transfers to the Baxter Theatre in Cape Town for a short season from 7 to 23 April at 20:00 nightly. Booking is through Computicket on 083 915 8000; online at www.computicket.co.za; or at any Shoprite Checkers outlet countrywide.

this article first appeared on mediaupdate.co.za

March 17, 2010

Filed under: catherine henegan, jimmy "wordsworth" rage, afrikaaps — ABRAXAS @ 8:09 pm

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February 19, 2010

the wishing wall, cape town, 19 february 2010

Filed under: catherine henegan, signs of the times — ABRAXAS @ 10:39 am

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February 7, 2010

noisewomb (hand)

Filed under: catherine henegan, art, noisewomb — ABRAXAS @ 12:04 pm

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February 3, 2010

CATHERINE HENEGAN

Filed under: catherine henegan, afrikaaps — ABRAXAS @ 12:48 am

Born and raised in Johannesburg, Catherine Henegan’s work revolves around performance and video. After graduating from Wits School of Drama, Catherine spent the latter half of the 1990’s working as a designer and theatre maker on several projects at the Market Theatre and Market Theatre Laboratory in Johannesburg. Many of those projects were collaborations with Lara Foot as a stage designer, their last collaboration together was in 1999 with the acclaimed production of ‘Ways of Dying’, based on the novel by Zakes Mda.

In 2001 she graduated from DasArts (The Amsterdam School for Advanced Research in Theatre Studies) in 2001 and has been based in the Amsterdam since 2000. In 2003 she founded THE GLASSHOUSE with writer and director Kees Roorda. They met at DasArts and were inspired to continue working together in an inter-disciplinary manner creating theatre, performance and installations both in and outside the walls of the traditional theatre space. Their most recent production ‘Waterkou’, a digital play, was critically acclaimed by the Dutch press and played to full houses through out the Netherlands.

As a video artist and scenographer she has created works for music concerts, visual art exhibitions and and theatre productions. Including ‘The Offering’ a collaboration with Ritsaert ten Cate of Mickery Theatre fame and the founder of the DasArts school.

2005 and 2006 also saw Henegan make her debut as a director with a media performance entitled ‘The Shooting Gallery’. The piece featured Aryan Kaganof in the lead role and sound design by James Webb. The piece was performed on the Grahamstown National Festival of the Arts and the Market Theatre in Johannesburg in 2006 . The Dutch version of the piece was the opening performance of Utrecht Festival AD Werf in 2005 and went on to tour the Netherlands in 2005.

Catherine is also currently working on her first documentary film ‘Uncle Louis and the Copperbelt Cowboys’. The documentary traces a personal journey to uncover the life and times of her uncle who spent half a century making films in Zimbabwe and Zambia.

February 2, 2010

kwamlamli - gugulethu

Filed under: catherine henegan, signs of the times, politics — ABRAXAS @ 7:45 am

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January 31, 2010

2005 Digital Soirée series begins

Filed under: kaganof, dionysos andronis, catherine henegan — ABRAXAS @ 6:05 pm

At the Friday following (4 March), internationally acclaimed South African film-maker, artist and writer, Aryan Kaganof, gave a stimulating lecture on the genealogy of the “digital underground” illustrated with screenings of influential short films including ANTINOOS by Dionysos Andronis – Greece (1991); SUBSTITUTION No.4 by Kiki Picasso - France (2002); and POEMS THAT SHOOT by Catherine Henegan - South Africa (2004).

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Kaganof concluded his presentation by showing his award winning documentary WESTERN 4.33. The documentary investigates the German concentration camps in Namibia where the indigenous Herero population were massacred in the early part of the 20th Century. Soundtrack includes music by Lamonte Young, John Cage, Friedrich Nietzsche, Macy Gray, Jesus Rodriguez and South Africa’s own extreme noise terror outfit, Virgins.

more info here

full moon, january 2010

Filed under: catherine henegan — ABRAXAS @ 5:41 pm

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January 24, 2010

meat in rotterdam

Filed under: catherine henegan, film — ABRAXAS @ 8:15 pm

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January 21, 2010

just good friends

Filed under: catherine henegan, caelan — ABRAXAS @ 6:46 am

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January 17, 2010

Filed under: catherine henegan, caelan — ABRAXAS @ 10:14 pm

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January 11, 2010

henegan and rage

Filed under: catherine henegan, just good friends, jimmy "wordsworth" rage — ABRAXAS @ 11:21 pm

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January 5, 2010

1 january 2010

Filed under: catherine henegan, caelan — ABRAXAS @ 8:53 pm

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January 4, 2010

Filed under: catherine henegan, caelan — ABRAXAS @ 7:33 pm

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January 3, 2010

at the masked ball

Filed under: catherine henegan, caelan — ABRAXAS @ 7:04 pm

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November 22, 2009

pax

Filed under: catherine henegan, art, signs of the times — ABRAXAS @ 6:24 am

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November 21, 2009

pax

Filed under: catherine henegan, art, signs of the times — ABRAXAS @ 11:24 am

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in memoriam ritsaert ten cate

November 20, 2009

babylon: vesterbrogade, copenhagen

Filed under: catherine henegan, signs of the times — ABRAXAS @ 7:36 am

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November 15, 2009

postcolonial liberation scene

Filed under: catherine henegan, photography — ABRAXAS @ 11:05 am

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lydia lunch’s big sexy noise in prague

Filed under: catherine henegan, signs of the times, lydia lunch — ABRAXAS @ 4:10 am

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November 14, 2009

prague carwash

Filed under: catherine henegan, photography — ABRAXAS @ 8:25 pm

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November 11, 2009

prague now

Filed under: catherine henegan — ABRAXAS @ 10:33 am

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November 9, 2009

prague now

Filed under: catherine henegan, signs of the times — ABRAXAS @ 8:18 pm

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prague now

Filed under: catherine henegan, signs of the times — ABRAXAS @ 9:58 am

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prague now

Filed under: catherine henegan, signs of the times — ABRAXAS @ 9:15 am

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