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The Guardian
29-06-2025
- Entertainment
- The Guardian
Make beads, not war: a bedazzled fighter jet lands in Seattle
Most retired planes settle for an afterlife at a boneyard or disassembly facility. A defunct MiG-21 fighter jet that recently arrived at Seattle's Museum of Flight is not most planes. While many decommissioned vessels collect rust, the Soviet-designed aircraft is blanketed from top to bottom, inside and out, in tens of millions of glass beads that explode in a riot of color. Titled The MiG-21 Project, the work belongs to South African artist and filmmaker Ralph Ziman, and stands out among heavyweights like the Dreamliner and the McDonnell Douglas DC-9 on display at the museum's colossal exhibition site. The vessel's sharp silhouette is softened by the beadwork's geometric patterns and shiny finish, which outfit every part of the small-yet-ferocious aluminum body and cockpit of the plane, except for the nose cone and afterburner. Ziman has spent the last 12 years covering decommissioned weapons of war such as AK-47 assault rifles with brightly hued beads for his project titled Weapons of Mass Production. The kaleidoscopic airplane, Ziman's final work in the series, is the result of a five-year collaboration between the artist and roughly 100 craftspeople based in Johannesburg. The jet found Ziman through a logistical partner who informed him about a group of Polish air force MiGs left to rot in a Florida warehouse. 'They often use these jets for stress-testing the pilots but this one didn't have any combat record, so the US military contractor decided they wouldn't use them,' he says. Ziman, who was already in search of the right jet to dress in beads, couldn't let this one wallow on the runway any longer. 'It was being rained on for I don't know how many years,' says the artist about his cold war-era find, which he shipped cross-country on a flatbed truck to his Los Angeles studio in 2019. Around 12,000 MiG-21 jets were produced during its 70-year history, making it one of the most-used fighter jets of the 20th century. They are in fact still in service in countries such as India and Pakistan. The warplane played a grim role in combat, from 1967's six-day war in the Middle East to the Croatian war of independence in the 90s. Ziman's urge to repurpose military gear was fueled by more recent uproars, particularly the Black Lives Matter protests. Seeing white cops in the US sitting on Casspirs, he says, referencing a commonly used police vehicle in South Africa, especially in the 1980s and the 90s, 'made me go out and talk about militarization of police forces even more'. Long fascinated by airplanes as well as Afrofuturism, Ziman says his project reflects his trust in beauty to initiate conversation about heavy topics. 'When you cover a weapon or a warplane with beads, the public, especially young people, can see them with a new perspective and become interested in talking about what they actually mean,' he says. The aircraft's role in South African apartheid particularly intrigued the 62-year-old. During the Angolan civil war in 1976, Cuba – which had made a pact with the MPLA (the People's Movement for the Liberation of Angola) – gained the upper hand through a group of MiG planes gifted by Russia. As a result, South Africa, which supported the opponent Unita (the National Union for the Total Independence of Angola), withdrew from the war. The MPLA's victory prompted South Africa to reconsider its position on the continent, helping to hasten the end of apartheid. 'I have always been amazed by this parallel,' adds Ziman. The eye-catching geometric emblems reflect craft traditions across the African continent, particularly in Zimbabwe and South Africa's Mpumalanga province, where Ziman's collaborators hail from. Ziman, however, omitted any direct reference to a singular regional ornament tradition such as Zulu or Ndebele, and rather opted for what he calls an 'eclectic pan-African feel'. The overall effect is one of communal celebration of the motifs commonly seen across the continent in beads, murals and paintings. The intercontinental project was both laborious and logistically challenging, requiring Ziman's team in Los Angeles to send casts of the plane's parts, such as the leading edge of the wing or the rivets, to Johannesburg as templates for the craftspeople to weave their motifs, with most of the beadwork taking place during the pandemic lockdowns. Among those spearheading the work on the South African side was Thenjiwe Pretty Nkogatsi, the founder of Johannesburg's women-run collective Anointed Hands, which promotes the long history of the Ndebele tribe's recognizable and intricately formed arts-and-craft tradition, which has been passed down for generations. Nkogatsi oversaw the project's leg in Mpumalanga, driving around the remote parts of the region for five years and commissioning craftswomen to adorn Ziman's templates. 'Different techniques stem from different subcultures and families, and we had to be able to master all in order to make the vision come to pass,' she said via email. She considers beadwork a way to 'break down cultural elements into smaller elements that we can incorporate into our day-to-day. They serve as a refreshed reminder of who we are and our potential of where we are headed.' As the vessel crescendoes Ziman's 12-year-long beading project, he admits: '[I] hate finishing things because I can no longer improve them.' He hopes, however, at a time when conflicts are sweeping the world, the project will offer visitors an alternative outlook and inspiration to consider ways to take part in the discourse. To that end, a portion of the proceeds from the beaded plane's potential sale will benefit a charity organization that works with Ukrainian children for art therapy. 'We will basically use this plane initially created by Russians during the Soviet Union to help some of the war victims in Ukraine,' he says. 'The work is already even more relevant now than when we started working on it only five years ago.' Ralph Ziman's The MiG-21 Project is open at the Museum of Flight in Seattle through 26 January 2026
Boston Globe
26-06-2025
- Entertainment
- Boston Globe
A cinematic lunar experience lands in Boston, and a symbol of war is transformed into art
Get Starting Point A guide through the most important stories of the morning, delivered Monday through Friday. Enter Email Sign Up The Museum of Flight in Seattle hosts the world premiere of 'The MiG-21 Project.' Kari Bodnarchuk Advertisement THERE Symbol of war transformed into art A fighter jet encased in more than 20 million colorful glass beads — painstakingly strung together by hand with cotton thread and wire — takes center stage in a fascinating new exhibit premiering at the Museum of Flight in Seattle. 'The MiG-21 Project' runs through Jan. 26 and features the final work produced by South African artist Ralph Ziman as part of his 'Weapons of Mass Production' project, during which the artist took objects of war — AK-47s, a mine-resistant Casspir military vehicle, and, in this exhibit, the most mass-produced supersonic fighter jet in the world — and turned them into stunning works of art. The aim: to encourage viewers to reflect on historical events and current conflicts, from apartheid to the militarization of police forces around the world. For this project, an icon of war and violence — a Cold War-era fighter jet measuring 51 feet long with a 24-foot wingspan — has been transformed into a symbol of beauty, collaboration, and imagination. Watch a 25-minute documentary about 'The MiG-21 Project,' which includes information on the teams of South African and US artists who created beaded panels to fit over almost every inch of the plane — from the tires and afterburners to the tip of the refueling probe — and interviews with the plane's original pilots. The exhibit also includes Afro-futuristic flight suits and helmets made with colorful glass beads and salvaged parts such as buttons, switches, and hoses from an authentic fighter jet; large-scale artistic photographs showing models in beaded regalia in front of the war objects; and strips of beads that you can touch — a great tactile element. See the main exhibit in the 206-764-5720, The ergonomic Moonbird device — essentially a handheld breathing coach — guides you through breathing techniques that can help with relaxation and reduced anxiety. Christine Smeyers EVERYWHERE Alleviate travel stress and jet lag with this clever device If road traffic, plane trips, family vacations, or other stressors make you apprehensive about summer travel, consider checking out a device that may help you calm your nerves. The ergonomic Moonbird device — essentially a handheld breathing coach — guides you through breathing techniques that can help with relaxation and reduced anxiety, potentially make stressful travel situations more manageable, or even assist with falling asleep faster and overcoming jetlag. First, download the Moonbird app, set up a free account, and sync the device to your phone. Give the device a gentle shake to wake it up, place your thumb over the black sensor, and then keep pace with the breathing exercises, such as 4-7-8 breathing and box breathing, both techniques for reducing stress and anxiety. Choose the duration of each exercise and whether or not you want audio. The device gently balloons out and retracts while tracking your heart rate and heart rate variability, and a calm voice guides you through breathing exercises (the device also works without the app, offering limited breathing exercises without audio guidance — perfect for bedtime or air travel). If nothing else, this handy device might help you forget about traffic, flying, and family drama for a while. The company has released new Moodbuddy bear- and bird-shaped breathing devices in smaller sizes for kids. $199 Moodbird, $89 Moodbuddy. KARI BODNARCHUK Kari Bodnarchuk can be reached at
Mail & Guardian
08-06-2025
- Mail & Guardian
Johannesburg's housing crisis is like a movie on loop
Housing crisis: The City of Johannesburg must take action now to prevent a repeat of the 80 Albert Street building fire in which 88 people were injured and 77 died. (Delwyn Verasamy) I decided to rewatch the movie Gangster's Paradise: Jerusalema. Besides being an excellent film directed by Ralph Ziman, I started examining the fictional protagonist Lucky Kunene. He is a symbol of struggle and represents individuals who were involved with the hijacking of buildings in Jozi's suburb of Hillbrow during the 1990s. The character Lucky is not a real person, but the movie is based on real-life events, and it got me thinking. How much has changed since then? Well, basically nothing. In fact, I think the situation has worsened. I was in the Johannesburg city centre the other day, and the decay is nothing short of a tragedy. Looking across the once-iconic skyline that was home to some of the tallest buildings in Africa, it's hard to digest what has happened to the City of Gold. At about the time of Lucky's rhetorical escapade in 1990, Ponte City was hijacked. Then, in 2021, they officially declared the building to be Africa's first-ever vertical slum. Riddled with lawlessness and gangsterism, it was home to 8000 people, which is way past the legal occupancy rate for this building. Water and electricity were cut off from the building, and people threw so much trash into the centre of the building that it built up 14 storeys high. In later years, when the trash was finally cleaned up, they found 23 bodies. That's a pretty big fall from grace considering Ponte was once the tallest building in Africa for 48 years straight, measuring 172m in height. It was beaten by a skyscraper in Egypt — only 5m taller. Someone suggested that Ponte City be converted into the world's first vertical prison. From a design perspective, this might not have been a bad idea for the building itself. But, from a surroundings perspective, a building with such a prominent location surrounded by corporations, bank headquarters and schools was probably not a good match. I took a tour of Ponte City and according to the tour guide, who lives in Ponte, there are seven hijacked buildings and nine abandoned buildings in the suburb of Berea, where Ponte City is located. According to reports over the years, 643 buildings have been hijacked in Johannesburg, specifically in the Hillbrow, Yeoville, Berea and Joubert Park areas. More recent estimates have stated that this number has grown to more than 1100 buildings. When a building is hijacked, it means that the building has been occupied without permission. The owners of the building, or its managing agents, no longer have control over the property. How does this happen? The owners of the buildings cannot be traced. They die, move overseas, or no longer pay the costs of maintaining their assets. Water and electricity are often cut off by the city, and there are zero sewerage services. These buildings then become unsanitary and dangerous places to live. All the while, criminals force the tenants to pay rent to them and not to the owners of the building. The hijacking of buildings is a symptom of seriously deep-seated social problems in our society. The government's way of dealing with the hijacked-building crisis reminds me of my favourite South African term 'now now' — which could mean they will start dealing with the issue in the next five minutes, five months or five years. The range is what you dream of with no concrete solutions in place or a timeline to make those dreams a reality. And so the solution to the abandoned building problem remains precisely that, a dream without a plan of action. Many of these buildings are owned by the government. How can our own government no implement its policies and reclaim what is rightfully theirs? Ironically, they love to pass policies, but what about when it comes to implementing them? People are dying in these buildings, and the solution is in limbo. Remember the story about the five-storey building at 80 Albert Street, Marshalltown in Johannesburg city centre that caught on fire on 31 August 2023? The building was constructed in 1954 during apartheid and served as the main administration office for Johannesburg's non-European affairs department. People of colour would essentially collect their 'dompas' here. Later on, it transformed into the Usindiso Women's Shelter until its By 2019, more than 400 individuals occupied this property. The emergency exits were all locked or blocked at the time of the fire, in which 77 people died and 88 were injured. More recently, I have read that our current Johannesburg mayor, Dada Morero, plans to relocate his office from Braamfontein to this building. Renovations of the building are expected to be completed this year. If our government cannot uphold standard occupancy levels and fire regulations in their buildings, how can we expect other landlords to follow suit? Herman Mashaba, one of the um-teenth mayors of Johannesburg over the past decade, floated around some good suggestions once upon a time. He proposed the conversion of dozens of hijacked buildings, abandoned and government-owned buildings into social housing projects. He brought to the table ideas for incentives such as providing investors with rates and tax exemptions for the period of one year if they could include an affordable housing component in their development. This was not necessarily a bad start as far as solutions go. However, I don't recall any of the above happening during or after Mashaba's tenure. When Mashaba left his mayoral position in 2019, the City of Johannesburg passed an Inclusionary Housing Policy at the same time to encourage private companies to build social housing in the Johannesburg city centre. More specifically, it provides incentives for buildings with 20 units or more to allocate 30% of their units for low-income housing. Many agreed with the principle, while others were strong critics of the plan's practicality. The sad truth is that when we fast-forward to 2025, I don't know of many projects that have actually implemented the Inclusionary Housing Policy to obtain its incentives. Sure, there have been approvals of a couple thousand inclusionary housing units since the policy's implementation; however, not many that I know of have been constructed. It seems the policy was not so attractive for developers after all. And so here we are, it's 2025, and not much has changed. We're still having the same conversations. Still walking past the same burnt-out and hijacked buildings. Still holding the same memorials for lives lost in preventable tragedies. Still hearing the same political promises that come wrapped in red tape and delay. What's most maddening is that the solution is right in front of us, and has been for years. We have the buildings. Hundreds of them. Some of the most well-located buildings in the country, in a city built on gold and ambition. But instead of being used as catalysts for urban rejuvenation, social housing, and economic upliftment, they sit empty, hijacked, or decaying, becoming ticking time bombs. Not to mention that building costs are through the roof (excuse the pun). Rebuilding any of these buildings today would run into the billions. Sometimes conversions can be a cost-saving exercise in themselves. Johannesburg's current mayor, Dada Morero, has recently discussed the city's plans to intensify efforts to reclaim the city centre and address issues related to crime and deteriorating infrastructure. I have also read that Morero plans to relocate his office from Braamfontein to 80 Albert Street. Renovations of the building, which were initiated after the fire, are expected to be completed this year. Late last year, Morero announced that these problems would be addressed precinct by precinct. Morero says fewer than 50 hijacked buildings in the city belong to the government. He also mentions that the city cannot find the owners of about 100 hijacked buildings. He suggests that possible expropriation without compensation could be a solution here. In my opinion, if you can't manage your own buildings successfully, what is the point of taking ownership of others? It should not take another fire, another news headline, or another round of blame-shifting for us to act. And yet, here we are, stuck in this loop of policy without implementation, vision without backbone, crisis without urgency. If the government is serious about solving the housing crisis, then we need more than policies that look good on paper. We need plans to be executed. We need a multi-pronged approach: removing the criminals demanding rent from tenants, support for tenants in hijacked buildings, repairing the sewage, water and electricity, and putting in place refuse removal. Public-private partnerships can rehabilitate abandoned stock, and real incentives for developers who want to build or convert properties for mixed-income housing could be provided. And let's be clear, this isn't only a housing issue. It's a safety issue. A dignity issue. An economic issue. A human rights issue. Until we stop viewing hijacked buildings as isolated cases and start addressing them as part of a broader urban failure, nothing will shift. We'll keep rewatching Jerusalema and asking, 'How much has changed since then?' The answer must not be: nothing. Because people aren't just looking for affordable housing. They're looking for proof that someone, somewhere, still gives a damn. Ask Ash examines South Africa's property, architecture and living spaces. 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