Collective project by Nina Barnett, Amy Watson, Dee Marco and Sinethemba Twalo
2024

In September 2022 our collective received seed funding by the Social Impact Arts Prize to undertake primary research on and alongside the Orange River. During the course of this 10 day trip we traced the Orange River from Gariep Dam to Alexander Bay.

The project considers the mythos and history of the Orange River, including historic water agreements in place, effects of infrastructural and mining projects undertaken by the apartheid government in attempting to control and harness the river. Thinking through and alongside the river we intend to document and critically reflect on the Orange River and the activities that take place within and alongside it and those who rely on it. 

In December 2022 the Orange River Project presented a sensory, multi-voiced installation at the Rupert Museum in Stellenbosch that served as an introduction to our collective thinking, and an invitation for those visiting the museum to think about and with the River, to consider environmental and questions of the past and future that the River poses. This installation included a sonic environment that drew from field recordings from our research trip, Orange River water suspended at the entrance to the exhibition space and lit up in glass vessels, hanging cyanotype markers of sun and air and hand-made paper and canvas made with the water as projection screens. This project is ongoing.