Nuwe Jaar
In Cape Town's historic District Six, over 100,000 people gather annually for Nuwe Jaar—a traditional New Year celebration rooted in Cape Malay heritage. The festival transforms the streets into procession and performance: the Kaapse Klopse (minstrels) move through crowds in elaborate costumes, horns and drums creating a wall of sound that carries both celebration and historical weight.
This is festival as reclamation—a community asserting presence and continuity through public joy. Shot from within the crowd rather than from its edges, the work traces how tradition moves through bodies: children learning choreography from elders, families occupying space that was once legislated away from them, the specific way collective memory operates when performance becomes archive.
The images ask what persists when a community gathers not just to celebrate but to insist on its own existence, to pass something forward that colonial history attempted to erase.
This is festival as reclamation—a community asserting presence and continuity through public joy. Shot from within the crowd rather than from its edges, the work traces how tradition moves through bodies: children learning choreography from elders, families occupying space that was once legislated away from them, the specific way collective memory operates when performance becomes archive.
The images ask what persists when a community gathers not just to celebrate but to insist on its own existence, to pass something forward that colonial history attempted to erase.
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