Sportscene aimed to celebrate an historical event within the South African context through the lenses of the lived experiences for the current youth. We focused on individualism and how that manifests itself in current day expression and how the individual can be supported through sportscene streetwear. Self-expression has been on the forefront of the youth narrative for the last decade and has found its way to being an identifying pillar for the upcoming generation.
We broke down the lived experiences and beliefs of the South African youth into for four main categories, namely: who you are, what you do, what you stand for and where you dwell.
Who You Are
Self-expression has taken a digital face. We wanted to showcase that by using digitally-related items as props. The props, however, are older items – this is to create juxtaposition with the modern and to highlight the fact that the youth are ushering in the new.
What They Do
More so than ever before, the arts are being celebrated and embraced by the youth. Content is being forwarded by this age group through different digital platforms and channels – we wanted to showcase this with items in the background while keeping the youth, who are the creators, as the focus.
What They Stand For
There exists a rich history of the youth fighting for what they believe in. Instead, of literally interpreting this, we aimed to use a cause that the youth is vocal about as a backdrop in highlight this very important part of the youth identity.
Where They Dwell
We aimed to link the live experiences of youth as an expression of the urban landscape of South African. Often dominated with intense lighting and bustling, we wanted to pair it back to highlight the people who give these spaces life and write the stories that set out the journey.
Within this breakdown, we wanted the audience to engage with the content, see pieces of themselves and how that can exist within streetwear – creating a platform for the consumer to be self, be safe to be individual and be supported in doing so by sportscene product.
We furthered the idea of the campaign, by having a spoken word piece written specifically to translate the narrative. The piece runs through the idea and the categories in a creative way and a manner that will resonate with the youth.
Jabulani Majola is a writer, artist, rapper and performer based in Cape Town- originally from a small town in KZN. Priding himself as rap lyricist, Jabulani also explores other genres and experiments with sound.
His piece expresses the core understanding of the South African youth and highlights their truths and experiences showcasing the power of the youth.