38. Sindi-Leigh McBride on Medu Art Ensemble and legacies of artistic resistance in southern Africa

Free City Radio

Listen to the 38th edition of Free City Radio which features an interview with writer and researcher Sindi-Leigh McBride speaking on the Medu Art Ensemble and legacies of artistic resistance in southern Africa within the context of the anti apartheid struggle and beyond. Recently Sindi-Leigh wrote an article for The New Frame on Medu, this is an excerpt : https://www.newframe.com/long-read-the-anti-apartheid-posters-of-medu/ Poet laureate of South Africa and founding member of the Medu Art Ensemble, Mongane Wally Serote, situates the origins of the ensemble by describing the context that gave rise to it: “Like the European colonial rulers, the architects of apartheid held a gun in one hand and a Bible in the other as they targeted and attempted to destroy the culture of indigenous Africans and all freedom-loving people. In opposition to such divisive tactics, Medu Art Ensemble originated in forms of unity and solidarity.” In SeSotho, medu means roots. It’s a fitting visual image for the collective that operated from Gaborone, Botswana, between 1979 and 1985 – and particularly for the underground dissemination of screen-printed and offset lithography posters for which Medu is best known. It is also a fitting description of Medu’s organically evolved organisational structure. The collective was comprised of more than 60 visual artists, performers and writers, mainly South African exiles but with members from Botswana, Canada, Cuba, Sweden and North America. The revolutionary collective was divided into six units: Publications and Research, Film, Photography, Theatre, Music and Graphics. Each unit had a life of its own, meeting to work and deciding on its own leadership structures and pace. Members often belonged to more than one unit, which similarly worked together. Medu members adopted the appellation “cultural workers”, choosing not to identify as artists because of the shared belief that as culture was of the people, it could not and should not be confined to the exclusionary art world of the apartheid era. Music on this episode by Issac Hayes. Free City Radio is hosted by Stefan @spirodon Christoff and is also a weekly radio broadcast on @radiockut, broadcasting at 90.3fm in Tiohtià:ke / Montréal on Wednesdays at 11h.