AmaLwandle - A Women’s Archive

Senzeni Marasela is a visual artist whose work has over the years addresses issues of womens’ identity, in various ways. Recently Senzeni and two friends Thando Khanye and Tusi Fokane, both film makers have launched a new initiative, Ama Lwandle, a women’s archive.

The archive is intended to house stories aboutSouthern African women, books written by women and women’s magazines, amongst other things. Senzeni thinks big. One day, she hopes that AmaLwandle will house a cmprehensive archive, that it will become the place that peope visit when they want to find out about South African women. When I ask her which institutions have inspired her she mentions the Anne Frank Museum, a site of pilgrimage and a rich source of information about the Holocaust, in Amsterdam.

For Senzeni and her colleagues the archive will go beyond being a simple store house of information, to become a place where women can learn about and from the past, a place that reinforces the links between the past and the present. Importantly they hope that it will help to root woment in the past, so that they’re not just defined by their contemporary experience. It’s also intended as a source of inspiration, for all sorts of creative endeavours: artworks, stories, films and other productions.

The issue of identity is ever present in Senzeni’s narrative, whether she is speaking about her work or the archive. Images of Sarah Baartman are present in several of her works “but”, she points out “South African women should look beyond this iconic figure to find the stories of other black women who are not as well known”. She mentions too that not all black women identify with Sarah Baartman’s story. For one thing, her story was, to a large extent played out in a different time and place; 19th Century Europe. For another, it reflects values and attitudes prevalent in the past, rather then the present. So, whle it has value, Baartman’s experience shouldn’t be used to define the experience of all black women in this country. “It’s important,” she says “for woman to feel at ease with their own identiity”.

I ask Senzeni about other women whose stories may be told in the AmaLwandle archive. She mentions several names, Nongqawuse, the 19th century Xhosa prophetess whose visions inspired her people to slaughter their cattle; Modjadji the Balobedu Rain Queen,  Nandi, the beloved mother of King Shaka. She speaks of other women too: Charlotte Maxeke the first women in South Africa to earn a doctorate in the humanities and Cecelia Makiwane, the first black South African woman to be licensed as a professional nurse, even Winnie Mandela.  “Black men” she laments, “have so many heroic moments to identify with, so many icons and role models,” listing Nelson Mandela, Walter Sisulu, Oliver Tambo, Shaka, Mzilikazi, Makana as men whospoke out, stood up, and fought for their beliefs, “women just haven’t achieved the same iconic status” she says regretfully, acknowledging that even attempting to close this gap would be a monumental task. Senzeni’s not just concerned with the ‘big names’, “the archive”’ she says “should include the small stories too, the experiences of women who were jailed because they broke the curfew by an hour or two, who left their passes at home or brewed traditonal beer.

Pointing out that there is no real narrative of ‘everday life’ Senzeni says that AmaLwandle will include magazines too – True Love, Destiny, othercontemporary titles aimed at women so that it can provide information about fashion, food, all the other things that women are interested in today. “Not just for now, but for the future” she says, adding that she’d like her daughter to be able to look back at the kind of magazines her mother read oneday.

The issue of role models and icons looms large in Senzeni’s mind, especially where these can help young woment to achieve their aspirations. She’s inspired by reality shows on TV because she says they demonstrate the way in which ordinaty people – Jade Goody and Susan Boyle, for example,  can achieve things they would never have dreamed possible. “At my age”, she says,” I’ve realised that your circumstances don’t have to define you. Just because you were born poor, doesn’t mean that you can’t change you life”.

I ask her Senzeni what the role of the archive is and she answers quite simply, “It has the power to redress, to make people rethink their situation. Think of a black child sitting under a tree in a deep rurla area” she says, “if that child knows about Charolotte Maxeke then she’ll understand what it’s possible to achieve with whatever’s available to you no matter where you are.” 

Senzeni describes a chance encounter outside the Museum of Modern Art in New York when, in conversation with a passing artist, she was told that “If we only make a difference to one person, if we change one person’s mindset then we have accomplished something amazing.”  “That’s who we’re doing all this for” she says,” for that one person”.

AmaLwandle’s still really just a spark in the mind of its creators, but with Senzeni’s vision and determination it’s bound to make a difference!

Senzeni Marasela’s works are included on the Johannesburg Art Gallery exhibition, Transformations:women’s art from the late nineteenth century to 2010

 

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