A CELEBRATION OF A CONSCIOUS ALTERNATIVE EXPRESSION. WE saw Pushat perform died and resurrected, died and repeat. By far Pushat has had an upper echelon dope complicated genius street flow mixed with flair and panache throughout the years.
That’s how we would also describe the entire festival aswell. The behind the scenes that goes in on the show is immaculate. We watched how the contenting department sits tirelessly on their screens writing and CAREFULLY selecting images from a pool of close to 10 photographers including us, who kept shooting and going back to dump images which where then edit by a quick and slick editor, which then where supported by a caption or write up to compliment the mood, while the festival happens. And thats just one department. All the others also work seamlessly like a well oiled machine.
Atlanta Georgia in itself creatively, is predominantly a Black State thats filled with so much soul which separates it from New York or the other for sates we passed by. Theres also a strong presence of the LGBTQIA ..(XYZ) 🙂 community here, so one would should expect extra wild characters with a dash of pink fluff we documented over the weekend.
The founders of Afropunk, Mathew Morgan and Jocelyn Cooper are troopers. You wouldn’t recognise them with the naked eye if you dont know them because the camouflage and blend in easily within the organised madness, walking from one department to the next.
To be backstage at AP is such a physical buzz. I mean its AFROPUNK!!! high up there with SXSW and COCHELLA. For the ONLY South African to be present and represent in these lands is just overwhelming, we had the opportunity to be a breath away from the THE INTERNETS who are super laid back rockstars that wilded for the crowd and Syd the Kid got all the women going bananas, she is 2 different people on stage and offstage which was super rad. Although PushaT had some technical difficulties he still murderd it. However, with that said, there could always be an improvement on creative execution with shows, even with rappers aswell. This off-course does not apply to N.E.R.D who blew the crowd off and commanded it in each and every song. Pharrell was also emotional with performing in Atl, he was one blink from a flooding tears.
This truelly was an eye opener for us. and cannot wait for the Jorburg leg in December 2018 for the 2019 celebrations. Thank You Afropunk team for such an awesome invitation to experience this amazing Alternative Black Pop-Culture Consciousness Festival of Self Expressionism.
ALL IMAGES BY @ZAC MODIRAPULA
