Inkwenkwezi Secondary School is a film I made for Noero Wollf Architects for the Venice Biennale of Architecture in 2010 and was shown at the Netherlands Institute of Architects the same year.
Narrated by Mr Kutu, the head of the school, it starts by describing the harsh urban fabric around Inkwenkwezi School and charting the morphology of its urban context. The signage which adorns the school's main facade is derived from the pop signage which the citizens in the informal settlement around the school use to advertise various services and ideas. A documentation of this popular form and quotidian township life gradually gives on to views of the school, which emerges in an appropriate fashion. The body of the film is held together by the footage of the promenade which leads around the enclosed public section of the school grounds, and the promenade feature is held by footage of two different fraternities using the school hall: Christian Adventists and the school body.
The sound is very important and comes from four sources. Live sound from the Canon Camera's onboard microphone, sound gained from an external Sennheiser Mic, sound from an external stereo EDIROL sound recorder and the soundtrack which was supplied by my friend Felix Laband.