Student awarded art scholarship
A DUT student was the first visual art winner of the Emma Smith Art Scholarship Award.
WINDOWS of Solitude, a short film about a group of four teenage friends who lose a friend to suicide, won the Emma Smith Art Scholarship Award 2014, earning it’s creator, DUT student Ndumiso Mnguni, a R50 000 scholarship.
Besides winning the award, Mnguni also made history by being the first Video Technology student to win the award.
The Emma Smith Scholarship Award was introduced in 1920 by KwaZulu-Natal sugar industry magnate Sir Charles Smith. Named after his mother, Smith’s endowment was made in appreciation of the work of visionary Art School Head, John Adams.
Originally, the objective of the scholarship was to provide a sum of money annually to assist the learner financially in order to study overseas.
Mnguni explained his film as “an introvert story on subliminal levels in that the use of dialogue is minimal and the visual experience is often quite intimate and spacey due to the use of atmospheric musical scores and the combination of moody lighting and minimal figures within the frame in which the audience views the narrative.
“The film exposes the individual characters through a transparent filter that allows the audience to examine these characters’ personal spaces and how they’re all being affected by death which introduces the thematic element of loss and discovery into the narrative because after Bongani dies, each character goes in a new path of discovery to find themselves as individuals,” he said.
In his films, Mnguni looks at individuals and their personal stories and puts them under a magnifying glass.
In the near future, he sees himself interacting with other filmmakers around the world and doing his bit in the expansion of the South African film industry.
“I believe that the South African film industry has a bright future ahead. SA has so many stories to share with the world and I want to be part of that growth.
There comes a time when the level of one’s work must reach a better level according to your ideas. Your ideas cannot be developing while your work remains the same,” he said, stating that winning the scholarship will help his work grow.
