The Dark City- exhibition at Circa in Rosebank, which describes the desperate lives in one of Jozi’s ‘bad buildings’ not even 3 km from where I stay, left me feeling despondent and disconnected from the city I’ve grown to love so much.
It was a quote by Rebecca Solnit in her ‘Wanderlust’ that forced me back on the streets this morning to walk from my place to the Fashion District, joining the Christmas-shopping crowd on Pritchard Street.
Solnit writes: “Many people nowadays live in a series of interiors – home, car, gym, office, shops – disconnected from each other. On foot everything stays connected, for while walking one occupies the spaces between those interiors in the same way one occupies those interiors. One lives in the whole world rather than in interiors build up against it.”
My walk to the Fashion District and back reconnected me with the vibe and colours that, next to the dark sides, are very much part of the whole world that is life in Jozi, the Colourful City.
Josine Overdevest – 20 December 2016
