Private Project

Fuck Your Fake Ass History: Mamoloyi Healing Ministries

The concept of witchcraft (Boloi/Boloyi) stems from a demonisation of traditional beliefs and customs. There has been a taboo around what African spiritual and traditional practices represent which has set a preference for a Western-translated, transferred Christianity, thus creating a binary between the two in a South African context.

This film draws from the premise of religious syncretism to realise the links, crossovers and realistic manifestations as reenactments of both belief systems in the context of Johannesburg and South Africa as a whole. Both belief systems have a space in which the supernatural is present; both have the power to achieve the impossible for those who believe and desperately need spiritual guidance, healing and possibilities for a better future. Welcome to Mamoloyi’s Universe. As we see the world through Mamoloyi’s eyes, she takes us on a journey through History. We see her role as a matriarch, a heroine, and constant looming power throughout the past, present and future. We are here to travel through time with her. To experience the endless options and possibilities of her history and ideas about the universe.

  • Malebona Maphutse
    Director
  • Malebona Maphutse
    Writer
    Mangolo, Mamoloyi (A Revival)
  • Simphiwe Ndhlebe
    Writer
  • Malebona Maphutse
    Producer
    Mangolo
  • Simphiwe Ndhlebe
    Key Cast
    "Lebo Mathosa (The Healer)"
    Entabeni
  • Malebona Maphutse
    Key Cast
    "Mamoloyi (The Time Traveller)"
  • Project Type:
    Experimental, Short
  • Runtime:
    13 minutes 33 seconds
  • Completion Date:
    March 26, 2019
  • Production Budget:
    625 USD
  • Country of Origin:
    South Africa
  • Country of Filming:
    South Africa
  • Language:
    English, Zulu
  • Shooting Format:
    Digital
  • Aspect Ratio:
    16:9
  • Film Color:
    Color
  • First-time Filmmaker:
    No
  • Student Project:
    No
  • Lost Lovers
    Porto
    Portugal
    May 24, 2019
    RAMPA
    N/A
  • Johannesburg// Fragmenting Space and Time
    Johannesburg
    South Africa
    September 11, 2019
    Underline: Johannesburg FNB Art Fair
  • Mamoloi, Moloi, Mamoloyi, ba re wa loya: Fuck Your Fake Ass History
    Johannesburg
    South Africa
    March 27, 2019
    Bag Factory Young Female Artist Award 2018
    Official Selection
Director Biography - Malebona Maphutse

Malebona Maphutse (b.1994) is a Johannesburg based artist who has completed her BA (Fine Art) Degree at the University of Witwatersrand in 2017. She works in and outside of the academic institution. She enjoys reading, listening to jazz, hip hop, tranquil, reggae, soul, neo- soul, folk and kwaito music. She is also a poet and enjoys writing. Her work has existed in/at a number of exhibitions, spaces and happenings. She is currently interested in a number of forms of making which include printmaking and video art. She also enjoys drawing as an extension of her practice.
Through print, video, poetry and installation, Malebona’s many interests have manifested into a complex matrix involving the existence of bodies’ historical, physical and spiritual existences in and around her. She has been investigating how bodies have passed, impacted merely existence and will encounter spaces - to understand the politics of space. Malebona’s inspiration lies at the zenith of infinite, but probable, options that can be drawn from these spaces. Through this form of investigation, she has gone on to explore a number of questions and situations that surround bodies.

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Director Statement

“The ritual in spirituality engagements that form in spaces inform a number of politics and I sort to divulge into these in order to create time-landscapes. I have begun to intertwine the mentioned politics in order to emphasize and rethink ways in which these bodies exist within but not limited to a South African context. This, to me, is a form of knowledge making and a recognition of different ritualistic practices in which the black female body exists and continues to morph. Mamoloyi is one of the ways in which I explore the above. In creating Mamoloyi I have sort to understand rituals as a means to rebuild, recreate and rethink our future, present and past in setting in flux, timelines that are convoluted and cyclic. The function of my work is to understand and create time-landscapes that provide options for the moment before and afterwards”.