Is it a bird? Is it a plane? Yes, it’s the Masanabo twins’ Ndebele art-inspired design for one of the British Airways fleet. HAZEL FRIEDMAN reports
IDENTICAL twins Emmly and Martha Masanabo are hardly conventional mascots for British Airways (BA). For one thing, they aren’t British or white. And that’s a definite liability in a country united by little else other than a belief in all things British, and whose former power was acquired by putting a “white-is-might” principle into practice.
Nor are they exactly members of BA’s frequent flier club. In fact at the age of 38 or 40 – their individual passports give them different ages – they’ve seen the interior of an aircraft exactly twice. They live in Wolwekraal, a village in the former homeland of KwaNdebele, where even a telephone is an unattainable luxury. Yet they – or rather their Ndebele designs – are the flag-hoisters for British Airways’ new global advertising campaign.
Call it a clever “think local, act global strategy” or, more cynically, the tail end of British colonial aspirations. Whatever, the once-mumsy airline has now shed its twinset, pearls’n’polyester image and gone multi-cultural with a 96-million global relaunch campaign. Until last week, all British planes carried the Union Jack flag logo. But in a move reflecting the fact that 60% of its passengers are not British, “the world’s favourite airline” – according to its slogan – has swopped its corporate identity for colourful images produced by painters, ceramicists, weavers, quilters and calligraphers from 50 countries worldwide.
While BA might be changing with the times, for the Masanabo twins change and time exist in a different dimension. Both married with children (Emmly has four; Martha has eight) and living within a stone’s throw of one another, their lives, until now, have been typical of all women in the rural hinterland. Situated near Groblersdal, the area in which they live combines the conditions of a rural shanty- town with a traditional village.
Though they live in poverty, the Ndebele community to which the Masanabos belong is imbued with a proud sense of cultural identity, expressed through vividly coloured – and now world famous – mural decorations. It is an art form passed down through the generations from mother to daughter, and in which the Masanabo sisters are particularly skilled.
“Emmly and Martha are the best mural painters in the village,” says Brett Sher who, together with Trent Read of the Everard Read Gallery, was responsible for organising the South African commission for the BA campaign. “When I first asked them what their work meant they answered simply: `Fokkol.’ But later I realised that it has a strong personal meaning that cannot be translated. What is most important for the twins is that their work looks beautiful.”
Sher, a dealer in craft and cloth, first met the twins 15 years ago when they would catch the train into Braamfontein to sell their wares at his mother’s shop, Granny’s Cupboard. But it was his brainchild – the Radio 702 decorated radio exhibition held at the Everard Read Gallery in 1993, and subsequently, the Unitrans show – that elevated the sisters from obscurity to the airwaves and then the airlines.
Read was contacted by the airways’ representatives after the radio show’s works were exhibited in Amsterdam. He located Sher, who contacted the twins. And so began a two-year period of intricate and secret negotiations between technocrats, traders and traditionalists. They involved media strategists, lawyers and translators (the twins speak only Afrikaans and Ndebele). But the final outcome depended on the Masanabo sisters, who had to seek permission to accept the commission from their husbands, in accordance with custom.
“It has been the most incredible experience,” says Sher, who was flown business class together with the twins, courtesy of British Airways, for the launch.
“The paparazzi were waiting for us at the airport. We were then ferried to our hotels in true British style.” He adds: “We weren’t prepared for the magnitude of it all. The only thing we could do was scratch our heads and say `Hau’.”
And yet, dressed in regalia, the Masanabos took the “cultural curiosity” treatment in their delighted stride. They posed, preened and smiled serenely for an awestruck press.
Then they returned home. “What amazes me about the twins is the grace with which they handle fame. It doesn’t seem to have turned their heads at all,” says Read on their return. “Their lives are about more important matters.”
Mind you, since their lift-off from obscurity to celebritydom Emmly and Martha have allowed themselves some indulgences. From a portion of the (undisclosed) sum of money they received for the BA commission, Emmly – who married in court – has recently splashed out on traditional wedding. Both have repainted their houses. And both have planned a sumptuous feast for the village when their children attend initiation school during the remaining winter months.