Parallel Lives
(Thursday 17 October 2013) Wavescape partners with surfing artist ND Mazin to raise money for a graphic storytelling project that aims to break down barriers between teenagers from the suburbs, townships and informal settlements of False Bay in Cape Town.
Legendary surfing mystic Bruce Gold even dropped in to admire the equally mystic Jungian rendition of the bearded sage Elijah in the clouds.
Money raised from the auction of an epic piece of surfing art in Muizenberg tonight will be used for The Parallel Lives Graphic Storytelling Project - one of the cultural initiatives planned for the October 2014Muizenberg Festival, now officially part of Cape Town’s World Design Capital 2014 activities.
The artwork, entitled “Parallel Lives”, is a 9ft longboard painted by Muizenberg cartoonist and surfer Andy Mason (N.D. Mazin). It will be auctioned this Thursday evening at the at the launch of Andy’s recently published collection of surfing comics, The Legend of Blue Mamba, at Muizenberg’s new creative hub, the Alive Café.
“Just go down to Surfer’s Corner any weekend and you will see what I mean by parallel lives,” says Andy. “It’s as multicultural a scene as you could imagine, with people from the wealthy suburbs, the struggling townships and the cash-strapped informal settlements all hanging out and having fun together. But how deep does this togetherness go?
They say that parallel lines never meet, and it’s the same with our parallel lives. We live shoulder to shoulder, but seldom venture outside of our narrow band of experience to explore the adjacent realities that run parallel to ours. So this is exactly what we want to do, using collective visual storytelling techniques to cut across the boundaries of our parallel lives.
“They say that parallel lines never meet, and it’s the same with our parallel lives. We live shoulder to shoulder, but seldom venture outside of our narrow band of experience to explore the adjacent realities that run parallel to ours. So this is exactly what we want to do, using collective visual storytelling techniques to cut across the boundaries of our parallel lives.
“The Parallel Lives project aims to involve a group of talented teenage artists from Muizenberg, Vrygrond, Lavender Hill, Constantia, Kalk Bay, Mitchells Plain, Khayelitsha and other adjacent neighbourhoods in a collective visual storytelling project.
“We don’t know what the end product is going to be – it could be a comic book, an animation, a movie, a radio programme, a multimedia exhibition or a performance – or a combination of these media. We have a year to put it together – the festival will be in October 2014. We haven’t started recruiting youngsters yet, but will be doing so very soon.”
THE EVENT: Exhibition and Book Launch of The Legend Of Blue Mamba By N.D. Mazin.
THE PROGRAMME: Book launch; Exhibition of painted surfboards, posters and original comic pages; fundraising auction for the Parallel Lives Storytelling Project; music by teen rockers Texas Radio; artwork, books, posters and artwork on sale. All welcome.
VENUE, DATE AND TIME: Alive Café, 11 Atlantic Rd, Muizenberg. Thursday 17 October at 6:30 pm. The exhibition will run until the end of October.
For more info about the Muizenberg Festival, go to: https://www.facebook.com/MuizenbergFestival2014?For more info on the Alive Café, go to: https://www.facebook.com/alivecafe?