Sunday, June 14, 2009

We declare the gold diggings open

Joburg is probably the most democratic of South African cities. Sure, the rift between rich and poor is an ever widening canyon. Sure the real money is in the hands of the few, and it helps if you went to the old boys schools. But if you have a smart idea and a gift for talking, you can make cash flow towards you. Easier than, say, Cape Town where its your pedigree that counts, and how many grape vines your family owns.


We built this city on rock and gold
Joburg has opened her dirty streets to Nigerians, Rwandans, Zimbabweans, Congolese, Mozambicans, Malawians, Cote d'Ivoirians, Senegalese and Ethiopians. Lets not forget that both her sky-grabbing buildings and her earth-burrowing shafts were built by migrants from the north. Well, apparently this was forgotten when so-called foreigners were chased, burned, beaten and stolen from, a year ago. But lets not dwell on that weird contradiction right now.


Come join us on the playground
So in the spirit of the inclusiveness that made this city, we want to throw open the doors to Paydirt, and invite people to collaborate. Do you have ideas, snippets of writing, stories or real life experiences that you'd like to share or see included in a unique collaborative performance piece? If you are a digital artist, writer, photographer, an image maker, storyteller, animator or simply someone who lives in and loves Jozi, you are welcome to send us a proposal for a project that might link into Paydirt in some way. Think exhibitions, online collaborations or site specific performances.


But that's not all
The play that launches in Grahamstown on the 2nd of July is still under construction. Currently its a melting pot catchment for portraits, landscapes and meditations on the Jozi experience, with a chopped up linear narrative running through it.

Be part of the first blog playmaking collaboration ever (that I know of)
Like the city that has been built, erased, re-built and is still under construction, Paydirt will continue to be shaped and tweaked long after its Grahamstown run. Or so we hope.
So here are some starters – taken from some of our chapter headings. We welcome stories under 500 words and they must relate to Joburg – portrait, landscape or still-life.
Lost
Park Station
Negotiations
Trouble
Friday Night
Traffic-Lite
Under Construction
Hillbrow
Protection

Send them (or your proposal) to playdirtplay@gmail.com
If we like yours we'll either:


Put it on the blog
Incorporate it into the play
Use it in one of our future reworked versions of the play

You will be credited. We cannot yet promise moolah, but if you invite more and more people to visit the blog we can persuade new sponsors to give us money and we can promise them some logo-space on the blog.
Go on, give it a go!

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Paydirt by Tamara Guhrs and Paydirt cast is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-Share Alike 2.5 South Africa License.