Lindiwe Matshikiza is a semi-nomadic multidirectional artist originally from Johannesburg, currently based in Marseille. She has a background in theatre-making and a special focus on exploratory performance, writing and directing. Her projects are largely process-driven, intuitive, collaborative, and often take on more than one form over time. In recent years, Lindiwe has been a fellow of The Camargo Foundation (France), Vila Sul (Brazil) and Institute for Creative Arts (SA). She is co-founder of multidisciplinary project hub, Motherbox, together with artists, João Renato Orecchia Zúñiga and Mmakgosi Kgabi. Her directorial debut as a filmmaker, One Take Grace (2021), was a creative documentary made in collaboration with Mothiba Grace Bapela over ten years, for which they won the IDFA Award for Outstanding Artistic Contribution (2021), BlackStar Best Feature Documentary (2022), and the Grand Prize, International Feature at RIDM (2022). She has since been trying to figure out how to sustain a full, free and flexible artistic life alongside parenting and other adult responsibilities.

Title: DUMB RAT YOU PUT THE DIE IN DIASPORA

Description: A (nearly) hour-long sonic mix from girl blue AKA Lindiwe Matshikiza AKA DRUNK BRIDE AKA The Secret Life of Plants in response to a brief from Naledi Chai / Fly Machine Sessions / Loving Parents / Mama Zeph...

Hey Sis,

You asked me where does Hate live in my mind and work and gave me a most excellent brief filled with prompts to go looking into past project files. What a gift to be able to make a love letter to Hate, that big blast of energy, most familiar to me when turned inwards. That crazy loud voice that threatens to extinguish, that gathers up all my shame and insecurities and sprays them back at me. It’s a force and a leveller. And, also, great fuel for poetry. For some time now, I’ve been working with [thinking about, failing to avoid...] interruption, noise, chaos. Artist Amina Ross hit on something major for me when they said Turbulence. You’ve caught me coming off a few years of creative and personal (same thing) turbulence and offered such a great way to process some of it.

The mix contains snippets from plays, films, audio projects, interviews, artist conversations, residency notes, some music, and some words from artists I heavily revere. Some of the records used are from Other People’s Collections, a project I started while travelling and thus out of reach of my own record collection, the state I have now been in for over two years. This mix is also a bridge between here (Mars) and there (JHB). Thank you for this brief: Your outstretched palm with yet another gem inside. Thanks for the invitation to go looking back through the hard drives to remember projects from other lives –finished/unfinished/unnamed/undefined - over a general span of fifteen years, which also means break-ups, make-ups, two kids, a pandemic and some epic voyages.

• L

• XXX

Image credit: Noah Cohen