INTERVIEWS/FEATURES: Lallitha Jawahirilal

Vuyile C Voyiya; Julie L McGee (2003) The luggage is still labeled : blackness in South African art. Documentary film, 60 mins.

Smithonian Libraries Modern African Art: A Basic Reading List
“For South African artists of color the demise of apartheid did not radically change access or attitudes. Separateness and difference still divide the contemporary art world into black and white. Black artists are beginning to take on some of these issues – – access, recognition, education. Despite initiatives such as Vakalisa (“Awake”), the Community Arts Project, or BLAC art project, South African artists of color are still disadvantaged. Formal art education, which was not available to artists of color in the apartheid days, remains an elitist enterprise with little collegial support. Michaelis School of Art in Cape Town has not yet shaken off its institutional racism in terms of student intake, faculty recruitment, or Eurocentric curriculum. Art criticism is similarly biased against artists of color. Old paradigms persist, e.g., “township art” or “black art.” Artists are still pigeon-holed. Freedom of artistic expression has not really arrived. Where are the black art critics? The South African National Gallery (SANG), formidable, unwelcoming, admits to huge gaps in its collections. Artists of color perceive SANG as another white bastion not yet breached. They feel that SANG is not interested in them and their work. To explore these issues of race and access the filmmakers conducted interviews with several South African artists and players on the art scene. Among those on camera are Peter E. Clarke, Garth Erasmus, Thembinkosi Goniwe, Zayd Minty, Gavin Younge, David Koloane, Mgcineni Sobopha, Berni Searle, Lallitha Jawahirilal, Gabisile Ngcobo, Moshekwa Langa, Graham Faulken, Marilyn Martin, the director of SANG, and writer Lionel Davis.”

Press clippings Lallitha Jawahirilal

INTERVIEWS/FEATURES: Shelley Barry

Passchier, Shmerah (2021) The Portfolio: Virtual-reality filmmaker Shelley Barry. Mail & Guardian 2 April 2021. Available online here [download pdf here]

Shelley Barry at Latitudes Art Fair 2020:
Whole – A Trinity of Being (2014)
Retrato/Portrait (2005)
Re:incarnation (2018)
As part of the group exhibition EMBODYING HIR-SELF, curated by Beathur Mgoza Baker.

Motsa, Sihle (2020) ‘Scars Should also be Crowned’: reflecting on Shelley Barry’s cinematic oeuvre. Africa South Art Initiative(ASAI). Available online here [dowload pdf here]

Staff Writer (2018) Paralysed by gangs. Fighting back with film. Beautiful News
[download pdf here]

Staff Writer (2018) How Barry’s disability never stopped her from making wonderful films. TimesLive, 28 March 2018. Available online here [download pdf here]

O’Reilly, Athina (2018) Film industry honour for ex-PE women. The Herald, 27 March 2018. Available online here [download pdf here]

Staff Writer (2015) Cape Town’s fearless females. A look at six trailblazing Mother City ladies. Cape Town Magazine
[download pdf here]

Staff Writer (2015) Feminist Filmmaker Meets Boss Bitch Rapper. The Journalist, 16 June 2015. Available online here [download pdf here]

Staff Writer (2015) Reader Profile – Scars, the body, survival…love for life. Rolling Inspiration. [download pdf here]

I am Woman. Shelley Barry. Season 2, Episode 17 (aired 28 July 2013)
Watch here, or here, [download pdf here]

Against All Odds. Award winning film-maker Shelly Barry reaches remarkable heights. ENCA 21 August 2013.
Watch here, or here.

Great Texts: Shelley Barry. GIPCA Projects 2010 (Gordon Institute for Performing and Creative Arts, now ICA) at UCT, 14 October 2010.

Filmmaker Shelley Barry will speak about her experiences and experiments in making films from a wheelchair and screen extracts of several short films in different genres reflecting on her process of creativity and production: Extracts will include, among others, a trilogy – Whole-A Trinity of Being, a documentary recounting survival of one of South Africa’s lesser-known wars, namely the ‘taxi wars’; Inclinations – a writer struggles to write erotica and deal with her personal life; Where are my heels? – a tribute to the spirit of a young girl child and Str/oll – a wheelchair user navigates the streets of Manhattan.
Find the content online: http://www.ica.uct.ac.za/GIPCA/projects/2010/GTBQSBarry

Listen to the presentation here:

Kgaboesele, Kitso (2006) Triumph. Shelley Barry – Trauma: Paralysed in a taxi shooting. Passion: Making real-life movies. Femina Issues 2517-2520.

You know that saying ‘When life gives you lemons, make lemonade?’ Look at what these three women made from their traumatic experiences