In 2024, the KT Wong Foundation brought two trailblazing projects to China. Firstly, an exhibition named Marvelous Realism, the first African photographic exhibition and largest one to be shown ever in China.
Secondly, Porgy and Bess, Gershwin’s beloved opera, for the first time made its debut with the Cape Town Opera collaborating with the Katy Wong Foundation and the Beijing Music Festival, was shown both in Shanghai and in Beijing.
What new worlds and what new possibilities are revealed of coming together from China and Africa? I love this production because there’s a dynamism in Gershwin’s music that is not just oral but visual.
Their story is about how they rise above those circumstances, through their faith, through their amazing energy and passion for life. It is really the hotbed of the best voices, the best training from Africa.
I spoke with Maestro Yulong for many years about this project and we decided that we must bring it this year. The image is maybe unfamiliar but the format is a language that we all share now. It will engender interest about what contemporary Africa is today.
Many people have a misperception about Africa being kind of one place. There’s so many different narratives that have to be told. There’s chains threaded into here. There’s a bicycle chain which talks about movement.
Marvelous Realism is a way of saying that the camera is a route towards possibility, towards visual poetry. The camera is a route to Africa in its multitudes, in its richness. This project, which I actually came up with, is the fastest way for people to understand each other.
What really the foundation does is to create cultural highways so that we can equally understand each other both ways.