6
Contents

EUGENE SKEEF

Monti wa Marumo!

PITSO group photo – King Street, Covent Garden, London. This photo from around 1982 shows a group of London-based South African exiles coming from a meeting to form PITSO at the Africa Centre on King Street. PITSO was a “broadly based non-sectarian, supra-politico cultural movement of (mainly) Black South African artists who realise(d) their great need as Black people to re-interpret themselves to the world, and to arrest the further erosion of the people’s culture by the alien, ‘dominant’ culture of the oppressor”. The South African photographer George Hallett (1942 – 1 July 2020) captured this iconic image. Hallett was one of the core group of radical SA photographers, which included Rashid Lombard and Jimi Matthews, who drew the world’s attention to the South African creative cultural struggle – both at home and abroad – through the acute and far-reaching focus of his lens. In the picture are: Front row, left to right: Moichopari Vincent Segwai, Mpumi and her daughter Maroro, Glenn Ujebe Masokoane, Mphiwa Yengwa, Eugene Skeef, Justice Mabhena, Nandipha Madikiza, Lionel Ngakane, John Matshikiza and Mbulelo Mzamane. Back row: Cosmo Pieterse, Greg Botlholo and Pitika Ntuli.
In the eighties in London, South African master drummer Louis Moholo-Moholo, originally with The Blue Notes, formed a radical, no-holds-barred ensemble called Viva La Black. Percussionist Thebe Lipere, who went into exile with the group Ipi Tombi (misspelling of “Iphi Intombi” by their white South African management company), was a key member of the band. This photo shows Thebe and Louis performing at Oval House Music School during Culture In Exile, a festival organised by Eugene Skeef when he was director of the school. Photo by Pete Freer.
Eugene Skeef brought Bheki Mseleku out of South Africa when he (Eugene) and his ex-wife Mary Edwards fled into exile in June 1980. Bheki was without a doubt one of the most prodigiously gifted musicians who emerged from South Africa. This image is from Bheki’s appearance at the Molo Songololo children’s exhibition in London in the late eighties organised by fellow South African exile and Biko comrade Lorna de Smidt. On the floor, next to the child, is Bheki’s tenor sax with the original mouthpiece of the legendary saxophonist John Coltrane, given to Mseleku by John’s wife, pianist/organist Alice Coltrane. Photo by Graham de Smidt.
Lesego Rampolokeng and Eugene Skeef at the Zabalaza Cultural Festival organised by the ANC and Anti-Apartheid Movement in London in 1990. Photographer unknown.
Singer/storyteller Sophie Mgcina with percussionist Thebe Lipere on stage at the Tricycle Theatre in London in the mid-eighties. This was during a performance of a music-and-storytelling family production directed by Eugene Skeef. Photographer unknown.
Eugene Skeef performing with Nii Noi Nortey and Gibo Pheto
In 1982, a group of London-based South African exiles came together at the Africa Centre in King Street, Covent Garden, London to form PITSO, an association of mainly (but not exclusively) Black South African writers and artists. L-R: Morena Monareng, Eugene Skeef, Gibo Pheto (son of Molefe Pheto), Glenn Ujebe Masokoane, Moso Bolofo (obscured), Ahmed Sheikh (Senegalese poet/activist) and Pitika Ntuli. Photo by Graham de Smidt.
Eugene Skeef performing on the flute with Thebe Lipere (percussion), Allen Kwela (guitar) and Ricky Edwards (alto sax) at an African cultural festival at the Africa Centre, London. Eugene was instrumental in arranging a UK tour for Allen who visited from South Africa.
Eugene Skeef on marimba
Former Malombo Jazzmen drummer Julian Bahula entertaining fellow exiles in his home in London. Left to right: Joe Tabane, Julian Bahula, Lefifi Tladi, Eugene Skeef.  
Photographer unknown.
Pianist/singer/composer Nomvula Ndlazilwana performing her specially written song at the three-week Monti Wa Marumno exhibition at the Brixton Art Gallery in London in 1986. Nomvula is the daughter of the legendary South African saxophonist/composer/bandleader Victor Ndlazilwana, with whom she performed in the Jazz Ministers from age 11. She famously wowed festival crowds as a child prodigy in South Africa and at the Newport Jazz Festival in the US. She was married to Bheki Mseleku, with whom she lived in exile in Stockholm and London. Eugene Skeef was instrumental in Nomvula’s return to playing the piano and singing by encouraging her to join Pinise Saul’s choir, first called Ziyaduma, but later changed to The South African Gospel Choir. Photo by Hazel Carey.
A performance of music and poetry during Monti Wa Marumo (Boomerang To The Source), the historic exhibition by exiled South African artists at Brixton Art Gallery, London, 1986. Eugene Skeef is playing a Ghanaian kogili (xylophone), Zimbabwean Torera Mutinhi Mpedzisi is on mbira and Russell Herman (RIP) is on flute. The poet in the scarf and the shades is Jacky Diale. Graham De Smidt, Lorna De Smidt and Hazel Carey are at the back.
Eugene Skeef’s Metaphorythms – with Russel Herman and Gcina Mhlophe at Oval House Theatre in London.
In 1990, the ANC organised the Arekopaneng Cultural Festival in London. On the day of this photograph, taken during a performance in a church in Lewisham, south London, Eugene Skeef plays a hand drum and is joined by Bheki Mseleku on tenor sax, Patric Tariq Mallet is reciting poetry, Russell Herman on flute and Mike Pelo on guitar. Photographer unknown.
Thebe Lipere and Eugene Skeef jointly playing the Ugandan amadinda xylophone during one of the many performances at Oval House Music School. Photo by Pete Freer.
Eugene Skeef performing with Wanjiru Gichigi and Gibo Pheto at Oval House
Peruvian dancer/choreographer/poet Luciana Proaño and Eugene Skeef improvising in a park in south London.
Peter McKenzie and George Hallet
Eugene Skeef with Miriam Makeba after he interviewed the singer for his BBC Radio 3 series on South African music and the struggle for freedom.
A group of South African artists living in exile in the United Kingdom in the 1980s gathered around the common theme of consolidating their relationship to their motherland. They gave the concept the title Monti Wa Marumo, which, creatively translated from seTswana, meant ‘Boomerang To The Source’. Monti WaMarumo was delivered as a multi-arts exhibition at the Brixton Art Gallery situated under the railway arches in Brixton Market in south London.The exhibition ran from 9 to 26 January 1986, and was designed to “capture the past, present and a vision of a future united Azania/South Africa”. It was presented as “an anthem of hope, organised in solidarity with the people of Azania/South Africa”. The core organisers were Hazel Carey, Eugene Skeef, Glenn Ujebe Masokoane and Graham de Smidt. The charcoal drawing at the centre of the exhibition poster was created by Lefifi Tladi.

 
Artists on show were Hazel Carey, Jennifer Comrie, Nic Fine, Gavin Jantjies, Ujebe Masokoane, John Matshikiza, Jimi Matthews, Metaphorythms, Bheki Mseleku, Nomvula Ndlazilwana, Lorna de Smidt, Nhanhla Nshusha, Pitika Ntuli, Russell Herman, Mervyn Africa, Graham de Schmidt, Shikisha, Jaki Diali and Eugene Skeef.

All photographs on this page from Eugene Skeef’s personal archive

Share
Print PDF
GRAHAM NEWCATER
borborygmus