The Talks
Emerging MastersSaad Moosajee: “You have to resonate with it”
Saad, as a visual artist and director, what would you say makes an image emotional?
I think for me, it's where you see something that you connect with and understand. You have to feel something and resonate with it on a level where that’s familiar, maybe you’ve experienced in some way, even if it's beyond description, right? And then, I think where it becomes most interesting for me, is to shift it or manipulate it… Playing with or distorting this thing that we do understand, that does resonate with us, I think can create an emotional impact.
How do you go about that?
Well, the cover I created for Thom Yorke’s “Last I Heard” video, which I also directed, is a good image: it’s just group of kids skipping through fire — it’s very simple. But it also almost looks like they could be on Mars or something, and everything is incinerated around them. But their posture is very playful. So for me, that can be quite emotional because you don't really know… It does two things. You wonder about them, their backstory, who they are and why they are there, but then it's also just an image that hopefully strikes you, that you might like to sit with afterwards, which is probably the thing that I'm most like drawn to. We're just trying to create images that stick with people.
“I think you know when you’re playing it safe, when you’re stagnating, and when you’re growing. It’s probably an ongoing thing for all of us — and a tricky balance. I try to learn at least one thing on every album, to reach out. I become my own teacher.”
“I think as you are growing up, deciding what you want to do is really the process of elimination rather than gravitating towards something until you land on what really makes you happy.”
“I think the best you can do for yourself is let your subconscious drive you, instead of doing things because you want to achieve some sort of glory.”
“I’ve been through some incredibly tough times in my career but I persevered and came out the other side. And that teaches you strength, how to handle being put under pressure. Experience is a big thing — just knowing that you can pull yourself back up again.”
“Architecture is the oddest profession. In the beginning you're very much involved in finding your voice and locating yourself artistically. For 25 years you're working with small projects, domestic projects. And then you mature at 50 and you're given your first projects.”
“It’s hard to watch the misses, it’s hard to be criticized. But you’re always trying to hit it into the rafters, and damn the consequences if you don’t make it.”
“I never thought of art as a career. I thought it was more like a monastic practice. It is something that you do – you can't not do it. If I made money doing it, I would do it; if I didn't make any money, I would do it. Obviously I’m not perfect but the thing I am best at is painting.”
“It all comes down to realizing how good you are and really consciously working with that. I think as an artist we always try to hide the imperfections. But the imperfections are there because we’re all humans, and this is what makes us interesting.”
“It's just so boring listening to false modesty. I've worked for many, many years so I'm really enjoying that my hard work has paid off… I think you should know your worth!”
“I was always trying to innovate; I don’t like repetition. Time is something that changes every moment, it’s never repetitive — I try to follow this example.”
“I would say that a strong work ethic is a vital ingredient for success. That’s something I was born with, I’m convinced of it; it was nothing that I acquired. If you take on anything, you try to do it your best.”
“I don’t regret anything. I feel that I’ve made what I would call mistakes. But everything you do is a part of you. And you get something from it. The idea and excitement of being in these situations and places — they are more than just memories, they inform your life.”
“My work and my life are the same thing to me. I don’t have a life on one side and work on the other side. My entire life has been my work. I don’t have a family, I am by myself, I have made very strict choices.”
“I have to free myself from my creation, I have to send it off, I have to give it up. And that is also the beauty, that you pass on something, that you let something live, that you allow it to confront. To get in contact with others.”
“I wouldn’t ever compromise on the essential, on the essence of a project, the ideas or the themes.”
“Failure is more interesting. Success only comes in one form. It doesn’t teach you anything. Failure kind of comes in all sorts of ways, and teaches you all sorts of things. You learn by failing.”
“I don’t like plan Bs. If you don’t have a plan B, then you can’t take plan B. Don’t give yourself an out.”
“I think when you’re an artist who’s been around for a while like I have you understand that it’s almost impossible to make work that is unanimously loved or understood! You can’t please everyone, and that is a great realization.”
“I have a tattoo that goes around my right wrist that looks like barbed wire, but it’s actually ANDAND linked together, which stands for “A New Dawn, A New Day.” It’s about waking up every day knowing that you have a chance to start again and forgive and be forgiven and to let go of yesterday.”
“I am less anxious to have a successful career. There were times when I was anxious — even in the past, people said, ‘You make successful films.’ But my films were never successful. Even The Godfather got a terrible review. My films did better over time.”
“One of the things that I’m striving for is an authenticity, to do things which feel natural and make choices which feel authentic and real. I think in a way you sort of can’t help sounding like yourself. You can’t help but put yourself into your work.”
“You can look at these tough times as an opportunity to get closer and to learn from each other. I learned a lot from my wife. There are so many things that pop up. If you are paying attention, you can learn every second of the day. Life is my guru.”
“For me it’s a lot about physicality, about how I feel. When you have these hardships or when you see someone you love in pain or you struggle, all the petty shit goes away. You are like, “I can’t believe I was worried about this other thing,” when you see what really matters.”
“I just want to do everything as good as I possibly can but it is also good to act on an idea and fail — and then you get something out of it. I think it’s really important to not be afraid of failure and to push yourself to try things and jump in the cold water.”
“You don’t have to please everybody. As long as you and the people whose opinions you respect are comfortable and happy with it, then… keep going! Keep making that weird stuff.”
“I act on intuition. I just let my intuition go in situations of fear. I live from my heart. I will continue doing things the way I have done them my whole life. And it gave me mostly a great time.”
“It’s a huge peace to allow yourself to be vulnerable. You gain a sense of freedom and understanding and forgiveness for being human. Instead of trying to control things and make it the way you want them, you have to be more open.”
“If you are ambitious, you are running in a tunnel that never ends. You will always find something new to go after.”
“If people don’t like the pictures, I don’t care. To me, there’s only one point of view: that’s mine.”
“I believe that you’re a result of the choices that you make. Each action has a reaction. Somehow it’s just all connected and I wouldn’t change any of it.”
“I always say ideas drive the boat. Ideas are a huge, huge blessing. That’s the thing you try to catch – an idea that you fall in love with. The whole thing doesn’t come at once, but fragments of things come and these fragments form themselves into a script. It’s a process.”
“I’m doing things more personally than ever before because that’s what my project is based on, that’s who I am and I have never been this happy my whole life — but it was a long road to get here.”
“Belief is very important. It’s like when you are riding a horse and you want it to go to the left, you look to the left first and then pull the horse’s head. As a human being it is the same thing: wherever you put your attention is probably where you are going to find yourself.”
“You have to open yourself. Just as in life you have to be open to other people, to other perspectives — it’s the same thing when you write. That’s what religion’s about, that’s what literature’s about, it’s what life’s about: the stories that you build.”
“One of the reasons why I have this much success is because I’m hard on myself. Until now, I never really saw myself as a talented chef! I don’t take the easy way. I put in the time. From the age of 17 until 23, I didn’t take any vacations, I had almost no days off.”
“Part of being a designer is to fail every day, to try things that don’t work out. In a way, every project fails every day until it succeeds! That’s what the iterative process of design is about. Timing in many ways is key.”
“I like the accidents, the things that happen by chance. I let the life come to the picture and the creativity flow.”
“Risks are very important to me. It’s the only thing that will define the next career move or else I’ll be plateauing. I’ll be completely stale if I don’t take risks. And that’s not just my career.”
“I have an irrational fear of boredom. That’s why I now have this tattoo that says “Carpe Diem.” That’s what we should live by!”
“I’ve been very lucky — I took the risk to do the things that interested me, so I could have no possible complaints. There’s nothing else I could ask for, really, and if I drop dead tomorrow, I would have had a terrific time.”
Liesl Tommy: “Let your instincts take over”
Ms. Tommy, is self-expression a form of activism?
One hundred percent. I became a director because I felt like I didn't have enough agency in terms of telling stories that really felt relevant as an actor, because you have to wait on what comes to you. But as a director, you can initiate projects, and that's what I was looking for: things that felt like they were resonant to me, that they felt like they had meaning. The value of advocacy is something that really resonates for me.
You grew up in a family of activists, right?
Yeah, and I grew up in South Africa during apartheid, in a fascist state where people were very afraid all the time. It was a time of enormous political upheaval, where people were taking to the streets in protest. As a young person, that's really my earliest memories. And I think for me, always feeling like we were second class citizens because of our race… It made me want to feel free. I lived for such a long time with this feeling of oppression and suppression, I think I always wanted to feel free to be myself and to express myself. And there's something about the drama of theater, and the size of theater that I think that made me feel free.
