I Wanna Rock Lefatshe

Dates: 31 July – 4 September 2021
Location: TMRW (The Mixed Reality Workshop), Johannesburg
Curator: Carly Whitaker

A sharing of space where two worlds were presented.
Artists Malebona Maphutse and Natalie Paneng each created their own worlds. Maphutse’s world Tsipa Tsipa Healing Ministries, which is in an apocalyptic state. It is a fictional metropolitan kasi Universe coloured with a mix of apocalyptic and somewhat hopeful tones. The universe is filled with architectural motifs from Johannesburg, Sophiatown, Tulsa Oklahoma, Ndabeni, Khayelitsha to speak to this rupture (chaotic moment) that asks for the inhabitants to leave their homes with the promise of a better future.

Installation image courtesy of TMRW

Installation image courtesy of TMRW

Paneng’s world ME HD, is a digital world where you explore and experience the subject in multiple digital forms. This world is experienced through viewing, listening and engaging with relics from Paneng’s digital world.

The exhibition presented both worlds alongside each other, declaring independence, sovereignty and co-existence that is encapsulated under the title I Wanna Rock Lefatshe, which is derived from the 2003 smash hit Rock Lefatshe by South Africa’s performing artist Keabetswe “KB” Motsilanyane. The song proposes to take the audience to an imaginary place, to a tomorrow where the listener would be freed from their sorrows, it proposes to take the audience higher. Maphutse and Paneng have came together to bring viewers I Wanna Rock Lefatshe; a tomorrow that is filled with imaginaries that may as well be considered in our reality.

Through the duration of the exhibition the artists presented their worlds’ histories and the coming together of the two in different performances.

Installation image courtesy of TMRW

The exhibition presented both worlds
alongside each other,
declaring independence, sovereignty and co-existence
that is encapsulated under the title
I Wanna Rock Lefatshe,
which is derived from the 2003
smash hit Rock Lefatshe by South Africa’s
performing artist Keabetswe “KB” Motsilanyane.