PROJECT
MAPUNGUBWE PROTOTYPE GROUP
UPDATE: Current research outputs from this project:
Reflection: Shepherds piece by Sinazo Tshayana
Reflection: Compressed files: second skin, solid as gold, to weather the storms by Bongani Tau.
The Mapungubwe Prototype Group is a multi-disciplinary prototype formula for AFRI’s hybrid education methodologies. Its name springs from the initial curiosity of Bongani Tau to explore the Mapungubwe region. In the exploration of this prototype, Scott Eric Williams, previously a member of Burning Museum, conceptualized the workshop as a prototype for the organizing of learning, for creating and for initiating business practices.
The Mapungubwe Prototype Group’s design sprint inspired an educational environment that harnessed a more poetic riffing of ideas around patterns and patternmaking in fashion as starting points for researching local fashion narratives. During the three-day design sprint in Giyani, Limpopo, the collective’s members participated in walks, interviews, eating and sharing, culminating in creative material outputs that will be available for viewing on the AFRI platforms. The workshop explored how indigenous knowledge might inform an African interpretation of Technical and Outdoor wear.
As a group of scholars, historians, makers, and designers The Mapungubwe Prototype Group leveraged their mutual interest in streetwear, the archive & sustainable fashion praxis to explore and experiment with ideas of how People of Colour codify themselves through dress to enhance their access to public, natural spaces.
The workshop was an initial exploration into how design can be incubated via a decolonial fashion process of non-extractive co-creation – a piecing together of fragments to create a coherent whole.
As an outcome of these highly experimantal research processes The Mapungubwe Prototype Group will work with sustainable upcycling practices to create a contemporary garment, a research zine consisting of a sonic work, photographs, sketches, and writings and vlogs.
Participants:
Bongani Tau @abengonigram
Collen Shoko @patchandstitchsa
Lomeo Mongwe @sirlomeo
Scott Eric Williams @weavetek
Sinazo Tshayana @sinazochiya
Photographs by Bongani Tau and Scott Eric Williams
The New Patterns: The Mapungubwe Prototype Group is a learning programme and a pedagogical exercise funded by National Arts Council Arts Organisation Funding.
