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Mail & Guardian
Mamaputle Boikanyo

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Mamaputle Boikanyo

Microchipped: Audrey Crews. Photo: X

News in Brief – August 8-14

Bionic woman After being paralysed for 20 years, the first woman to receive Elon Musk’s Neuralink brain implant was able to write her name by using thought alone, The Debrief…

Woodrock café purrfecting Joburg one cat at a time

A café has created a cosy space for animal lovers to eat, work and lounge among 19 charming felines

Tangible elements: ‘Ilangalibalele’ uses steel, wood, imphepho. Photo: Supplied

Meditations on the interconnectedness of the earth, the body and spirituality

Buhlebezwe Siwani’s new exhibition is both a project for healing and an appreciation of traditional indigenous knowledge systems and medicine

Expressions: Charity Vilakazi’s work, such as  ‘Isisho II, Ibomvu ‘

Through the matriarchal gaze

In her paintings, Durban-born Charity Vilakazi offers a perspective on African societies with women as the drivers of social change and healing

The tide is slowly turning on uncritical pro-West reporting on issues such as Russia’s war on Ukraine (above) or Israel’s genocide in Gaza. Photo: Bulent Kilic/AFP

In brief: A review of 2022

Let’s look back on key moments that shaped 2022

Synergy: The Keiskamma Guernica (above), on display at Constitution Hill, was inspired by Spanish artist Pablo Picasso’s 1937 painting Guernica.

Stitching together femininity, history and community

An exhibition of tapestries handmade by women from an Eastern Cape village has made its way to Johannesburg, offering stories of healing, nature and survival

Captivating: In her latest thriller, Margie Orford explores how a crime never ends. Readers are exposed to the emotions of the victims – the rage and the shame they feel – and the shamelessness of the criminals.

Book Review: Revenge for sexual abuse is in the eye of the beholder

Margie Orford’s latest thriller explores the ripple effects of crime and the intimate worlds of its victims

Zakes Mda’s depictions of Mgcineni Noki — the man in the green blanket — who was gunned down in the Marikana massacre.

Zakes Mda’s latest exhibition Uza Nemvula celebrates ordinary people

The well-known author cherishes ordinary figures, healing, performance and his late great friend Hugh Masekela

 Mary Sibande’s ‘Wielding’. The joint exhibition of the work of these two artists, born nearly a century apart, is the fourth in a series of legacy exhibitions pairing prominent South African artists. Photos provided by Strauss & Co.

Domestic workers the thread linking Mary Sibande and Dorothy Kay – two artists born a century apart

Dreaming Invisible Connections, a exhibition by postmodernist Mary Sibande and classical painter Dorothy Kay, highlights the domestic worker – in different ways

Encore: James Ngcobo, the former artistic director of the Market Theatre Foundation, begins the second act of his career as head of Joburg City Theatres. Photo: Delwyn Verasamy

James Ngcobo’s second act

The actor and director who saved The Market during the pandemic is enthusiastic about his new job as head of Joburg City Theatres

Bulelani Mabutyana (left) and Siphenathi Mayekiso in ‘ImbiliniPhotos: Fahiem Stellenboom, Nicole Laxton Photography and Instagram

Visibility and inclusion matters

Well-known people with albinism are changing the way society sees those with this skin condition

Healing: Asanda Rumbu’s photograph ‘Staying Afloat’ (above) illustrates her surviving rape.

Reframing rape through the lens of magical realism

Elisa Iannacone, herself a rape survivor, gives other survivors the power to present their stories through her photographic exhibition

Point of no return: Astronomers recently released the first image of Sagittarius A*, the black hole at the centre of the Earth’s Milky Way. Not even light can escape a black hole

Your world in brief: Big Macs and snake karma

The news and numbers you missed this week.

Revitalise: Visitors to the Franschhoek Literary Festival do more than talk about books. They take the opportunity to visit wine estates such as  La Motte, enjoy good food and wine at The French Connection restaurant or, as writer Melinda Ferguson plans to do,  take a drive along the scenic Franschhoek Pass. (Photos: Mattes Renè/hemis.fr/AFP and Jaco Combrinck)

More than just a book festival

After a two-year hiatus, the Franschhoek Literary Festival is once again face to face. Some literary icons tell us about their favourite spots at the book event

A bus set alight is pictured near Sri Lanka’s outgoing Prime Minister Mahinda Rajapaksa’s official residence in Colombo May 9, 2022. Photo by ISHARA S. KODIKARA/AFP via Getty Images)

Your world in brief: Fenty Beauty hits Africa and a load-shedding wife swap

The news and numbers you missed this week