One Take Grace (by Lindiwe Matshikiza)

An experimental cinematic portrait of Mothiba Grace Bapela (58), South African mother, grandmother, film & television actor, and former domestic worker for over forty years. Bapela recounts and performs some of her life experiences, observing and absorbing what goes on in the intimacy of other people’s homes and families - ranging from the banal to the macabre - while suppressing her own frustrated desires and trauma. Narrated by Bapela herself, it is the perspective of one who has spent the majority of her life servicing the dreams of others, attempting to use her experiences to break through to her own. Director Lindiwe Matshikiza leads a multidisciplinary creative process in producing this collaboratively-made portrait of the often precarious, sometimes miraculous position of an African female migrant worker.

I made drawings that were animated and included in the film.