COLLATION 3 | THE UNEXPECTED CITY

“All cities have personalities. Johannesburg is understood as an electrifying city that’s fast and ever-changing, comprised of various exposed and submerged working parts, always seemingly on the precipice of collapse or great change. It is this everyday complexity that is of interest.” – Neo Muyanga 

From 27 to 29 March 2025, The Centre for the Less Good Idea presented the third iteration of its COLLATIONS series, The Unexpected City.

Curated by The Centre’s Impresario, Neo Muyanga, and following on from the first two COLLATIONS – Visual Radio Plays, and Sounding Pictures – COLLATION 3 | The Unexpected City engaged the city through its artists, inhabitants and everyday voices in order to build a programme of short-form theatre, site-specific performances, films, and installations.

For The Unexpected City, The Centre was interested in engaging the people who survive and thrive in the city, and invited them to share their ways of seeing and navigating the city, particularly downtown Johannesburg, as artists.

“We see the Johannesburg CBD as being emblematic of the city of the Global South in the 21st century, and we are interested in making art through it, with it,” explains Muyanga. “We envision a programme that is partly based at The Centre and partly in the public, with artists responding to the central provocation of The Unexpected City on the stage and out in the streets of Maboneng.”

Through the work presented in The Unexpected City, The Centre staged an interrogation of the city and the possibilities it presents to those who reside here, but also what it takes from us as we transit through it. Similarly, there was an interest in engaging Johannesburg as a city that has echoes and resonances across both national and international borders. 

Sketching the city, Johannesburg soundscapes, and interactive murals 

The Unexpected City was a three-day programme featuring staged theatre works, public performances, sonic and visual installations, and interactive murals, all emerging from a creative interrogation of the city and how we engage it. 

Four different playwrights came together to comprise the staged performance programme in The Centre space. Following the format of sketches – short, sharp devised dramas – these works are by Jefferson Tshabalala, MoMo Matsunyane, Balindile ka Ngcobo, and Melusi Mnqobi Molefe, each work presenting a unique perspective of the city. 

A collaboration between The Centre and The University of Johannesburg’s Graduate School of Architecture saw post-graduate architecture students working alongside The Centre’s scenographer Nthabiseng Malaka to create responsive set and design elements, which also formed an installation in the Events Space, capturing fragments of the city.   

The Johannesburg-based sound art collective, Playgroup, (Jill Richards, BJ Engelbrecht and Jurgen Meekel) facilitated a three-day creative programme resulting in a sound installation in the Events Space. Participants were invited to explore the soundscape of Maboneng by creating audio recordings of their experiences using mobile phones. By prompting the public and the local community to interact with the sounds of their environment, the project aimed to open our ears to new possibilities for experiencing the city. On Saturday 29 March, a listening session and discussion took place in the Less Good Lounge.

Also in The Events Space was the Jeppestown-based isicathamiya group Dumbe Jealous Down who activated the space through a daily open rehearsal. Linked to this was a film by artists Stephen Hobbs and Angel Khumalo which centred around both Dumbe Jealous Down and the Jeppestown building that Khumalo used to live in. The film was projected in and around Arts on Main. 

South African mural artist and curator Nonka Mbonambi, along with a team of local artists, was invited to design a large-scale mural that adorns a wall on Main street, just outside the Arts on Main building. There were also two interactive, ‘mobile’ walls – one in The Atrium and one that was situated between Fox Street and the Arts on Main Courtyard, inviting members of the public to leave their mark.

Performance artist Qondiswa James presented a once-off, site-specific performance in the city, speaking to the realities of life and death in the city, and those who are lost to Johannesburg.

Finally, cultural collective Narowbi partnered with The Centre to activate the Arts on Main courtyard through a curated experience merging poetry, live music, and DJ sets before and after the programmes at The Centre.

Full video recordings, photography, and written reflections on COLLATION 3 | The Unexpected City are available here.