In Cape Town, weekly classes are held in various venues in Hout Bay and Fish Hoek, and other artists who have worked with the kids include the Essop twins and Peter Clarke. So now it was up to me to think of a project to do with the 15 – 18 year olds in a regular classroom with no real space to spread out or make a mess. I decided to do a Hout Bay version of my ‘Other Voices Other Cities’ project, in which I ask residents of a place what it is that distinguishes the place they live in from any other.
The kids at the school have tough lives – many are the children of immigrant families, coming up against local xenophobia. In the workshop session where we talked about what they felt about living in Hout Bay, one girl’s statement was that she did not get mugged – very often. The statement which received the most votes in the end was: NICE VIEW BUT MOST PEOPLE ARE JEALOUS AND GREEDY. So that was the text we made up in cardboard letters.
Right outside Hout Bay High is a perfect spot for the shoot – a vacant lot with the beautiful Hout Bay harbour spread out below. I did a test shoot in March, but 10 days ago, it was time to do the real thing.
Hasan Essop took the pix, I directed the shoot, (it’s amazing how hard it is to get a group of people to hold letters straight for more than a few seconds) and the rain held off just long enough for us to get it all done.
The soft greyness of the day made the bold colours of the letters the kids had painted even more of a contrast than in the bright summer sunlight of the test shoot.
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