Sustainable Human(e)Settlements: The Urban Challenge (2012)
This iteration emanates from the process of making a documentary film titled Sustainable Human(e)Settlements: The Urban Challenge (2012). The work was conceived and produced in the context of the eponymously titled conference convened by Prof. Amira Osman at the University of Johannesburg.
The film premiered at the UN-Habitat: World Urban Forum 6, Naples, Italy 2012.Like any director, at the end of the shooting process, I was left with hours upon hours of interview material which I had to edit into a coherent, seamless ‘argument’ lasting a mere hour or less,following the narrative and structural conventions of an orthodox documentary form. Sifting through the complex discourse offered by architects, urban planners, government officials, art practitioners, academics and urban residents in my editing room, led me into the discursive vortex that I had to unravel. It is through this process that I transgressed my disciplinary certitudes as an artist/filmmaker/researcher and delved into not only the architectonics but also the nuts and bolts of how cities function.
Founding member of the Dala Collective
Founder and Principal of MAKEKA Design Lab.
Vignettes
Nduka Mntambo: Does the blend of art and architecture in your practice with the Dala Collective become a vessel by which you explore alternative ways of comprehending space?
Doung Anwar Jahangeer: Absolutely! In the beginning, the idea of me being an artist became almost like a strategy. I became very quickly aware that the orthodox architectural practice does not allow self-critique or to allow for insight. I use contemporary art as a weapon, a tool to infiltrate spaces and come close to people, because that resonates with me. In the practice of art, I think myself in a place where there are endless possibilities.
— Sustainable Human(e)Settlements: The Urban Challenge (2012)
Nduka Mntambo: I get the sense of the failure of imagination within the planning fraternity.Is it is time for reflection, now that we have had enough time to do empirical research. What I am trying to understand from you is that, do we need something quite radical to disrupt the planning deficiencies that you spoke about?
Mokena Makeka: I think so, radical change has to happen at many levels. In some ways,one could argue we are sitting on a time bomb as a society. Because we have had a negotiated settlement, that is meant that sometimes we do not really explain or discuss things as much as we should because it is much more important to hold hands and walk into the sunset together. Maybe we accepted our anthem too quickly. Maybe we rushed into the rainbow flag. Perhaps we should have drawn out these things. Maybe cultural healing that we spoke about, should not have been a statement; it should have been a movement. So when there are certain traditions that we should rightfully evolve away from, we hold on to them tightly and the ones that we should protect, we chuck them away. So, you know, one day, some smart person will write about the effects of Apartheid, and it will be much more than the spatial geography. It will be about a mindset which hurt a whole generation of people. So for me, that is a radical change, and I think once that happens, one will be a little bit comfortable having a conversation about what is the form of contemporary Johannesburg,for instance.
— Sustainable Human(e)Settlements: The Urban Challenge (2012)