Barry Streek
Craftswomen from the rural areas of KwaZulu-Natal will be exhibiting their products at this month’s international conference on Aids in Durban as a result of a unique project to promote HIV/Aids awareness through design.
The Rural Craft and HIV/Aids Awareness project has been operating in KwaZulu- Natal, the region with the highest reported figures of Aids-infected people in Southern Africa.
“Since early last year critical HIV/ Aids awareness has been transmitted to the makers with inspirational results,” Kate Wells from ML Sultan Technikon told the Design Education Forum conference, Reshaping South Africa by Design, at the Cape Technikon last week.
“The makers have responded to their new awareness through the making of their dolls, beaded jewellery and telephone wire baskets, allowing them a platform to talk openly.
“Affirming their knowledge by the development of truly contemporary artefacts using messages with meaning has led to knowledge empowerment and confidence for the future in the face of the daunting Aids epidemic in KwaZulu- Natal.”
Workshops attended by the crafters “illuminated the invaluable and powerful contribution that design concepts can make to demystifying the threat of the Aids virus in rural communities.”
Wells said participants at the workshops were encouraged to render pictorially their image of awareness through their own medium of making.
“A key objective of the project was to raise awareness. Straight talk was the order of the day. The craft product encapsulates an idea. This procedure optimises the opportunity to express, to address fears and to relate personal stories as the craftspeople came to terms with their new awareness.”
Thousands of highly skilled rural craftspeople and artists participated in the workshops, all of whom took their role very seriously. The three rural craft groups in the project were beaded cloth doll makers, beaded jewellery makers and telephone-wire weavers.
Wells said interviews with six of the crafters established that none of them had any prior knowledge of Aids before the workshops.
“They only spoke of hearing ‘rumours’ of Aids but nobody in their community would talk openly. Since the workshops they feel a lot more confident and have all managed to inform their families, with the best results coming from their children and peers. At the same time they have to be careful as to how they go about the spread of information beyond the boundaries of the family networks, as advocating preventative measures too boldly could be personally detrimental.
“The role of design as a tool to educate, provide healing and transfer crucial knowledge in communities has proved invaluable.”
Wells said their craft products would be exhibited as part of the Amasiko cultural programme at the conference, which is being held between July 9 and 14, and would eventually be showcased to be used as a teaching tool to enhance the practice of design excellence through the preservation of traditional crafts.