Juju Boy's sensual music video: Is it art?

MONKAGEDI GAOTLHOBOGWE
Staff Writer | Wednesday October 26, 2011 00:00

 

He refers to it as mild material, which is also too deep for children to discern the sexual connotations that can only be decoded by the initiated.  Not that it is rated, 'For Adults Only', but Juju Boy thinks images conjured by his video girl sensually licking a banana, as well as the crowd at the orgy ripping apart one another's clothes, or himself suggestively touching a woman's thigh lying on a Roman bed, are just mild stuff compared to what our children are daily bombarded with in soapies, movies and some other material.

The video, which is also on YouTube, has already rotated more than 10 times on Botswana's only nationwide television channel, Botswana Television (Btv) since its release two months ago, but remember when it comes to sensual music video material, Btv's standards sometimes boggle the mind as they did when they played a heavily sensual music video by local poet, Berry Heart early this year.

While any viewer of Juju Boy's Emotional video concurs that it appears like it was shot at Hollywood, it is the concept of exhibiting sexual freedom in the video that might cause one to wonder whether this is art at work or Juju Boy advocating loose morals in a country ravaged by the HIV and AIDS scourge through the very same carelessness in bed.

The utopian video takes the viewer to a dreamland where there are no rules.  In fact Juju Boy, real name Kgotla Ntsima, says the concept of the music video was inspired by the ancient Roman orgies when at the height of the Roman civilisation people would meet in open spaces for sexual gratification.  Indeed in the video Juju Boy stars as a Roman official treated to a good time of orgy by sensual women while many people at the party also mind their own business.  The attire chosen for the music video is ancient Roman wear; the sort of wear found in movies such as Spartacus, Troy, and 300, something that, creativity wise, has been quite impressive for a local artist.

Juju Boy says he engaged the services of a local designer called Toni, who actually designed the clothes on set. Being a graphic designer himself, Juju Boy says he also lent his hand as a creative director in charge of the look and feel the colour as well as the clothes.

The video also appears to have been shot at some exclusive location where hundreds of people, men and women, treated themselves to a good time of lawlessness, but the artist says he actually used a technique called, green screen, whereby one at a time, they performed in front of a green curtain.

Afterwards the shots were edited and superimposed, while the number of extras, which was originally 15, was multiplied into hundreds using the technology.  'Otherwise everything was shot inside the studio, it is the editing and creativity applied that makes it look so fabulous, we tried to experiment; at the end of it all, we all thought it was worth trying.'