Duality

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Waking up in Cape Town Nov 2025

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About the Project

I had been writing and pondering on the idea of Duality for some time. This project arose from a trip to South Africa in early 2023 for a friend's wedding. This country became the place that catalysed my questioning around the theme of Duality.

I am mixed- half English, half Sri Lankan Tamil. Brown in a white world and white in a brown world. You mask one identity whilst conforming to the norms of the other setting. But the two identities coexist whether you like it or not. This is where my interest in duality began.

Quantum superposition is a phenomenon in which a tiny particle can be in two states at the same time — but only if it is not being directly observed (Thomson, 2025).

Observed. That’s what I did in South Africa. Observe the post apartheid legacy. How can these people live like this, whilst these people live like this? Cannot fathom seeing ‘two states at the same time’. See the two. On the same land- centimeters from each other, co-existing with no relation.

Who lines the pavements waiting at the taxi stops (minibus stops) and leaves the city at the end of the day? Who gets to stay? With access to the sea view.

We take a private minibus to a winefarm, passing townships on the way.

I whisk my eggs in the morning whilst listening to a woman on the news cry out that her son has been shot whilst collecting food. Then eat and sit at my desk- work. She doesn’t stop crying because I’ve pressed pause on my iPhone.

Here I question my positionality in the system. ‘Us’ and ‘them’. This project explores ways to see. Acknowledge both.

I write and draw and paint as a meditation on the two realities– overlapping the realities of simultaneously opposing worlds.

People (us) and people (them). We are all people. People are people.

Waking up in Cape Town

Written April 2024, Painted November 2025

A reflection written on my first trip to South Africa. Feeling strange in my position as a British tourist - struck by the post apartheid legacy - something you cannot unsee. ‘But it’s just the same back home (London)’ friends argue. It’s certainly different there. Excessive warnings (some may argue not) about safety and my frustration around that- where is that coming from? Have you judged the alleged ‘unsafe’ offender fairly? ‘People are people, trying to survive’ - that is all I kept thinking.

Last night I went on a date. Had a six course meal with red wine that we swirled, sniffed and sipped. We conversed, the textures of our conversation not dissimilar to those on our plates. We spoke about the inequality that prevails in South Africa.

It’s uncomfortable, it’s strange. Who to trust with advice about safety? People are people, I keep thinking.

This morning I woke up one minute before my alarm went off on my iPhone.

Fifth floor in Seapoint, Cape Town, a partial view of the sea. The wind has calmed today. Neck stiff, I do some spinal rotations and let my body double over and neck hang.

Open the blinds. Blue sky and bright. Glance down to the street, two young men search through wheelie bins. Seagulls in tow, they want a piece of the pie.

Bins in a line, plastic bags of every colour, they open, check. Retrieve items if they’re lucky. A rehearsed routine, they are experts in this exercise, have honed their skill.

They speed up. A truck is coming. Thought it was carrying oil of some sort, but it's the bin men.

One of the young men finds a garish sun shaped silver wall clock. Picks it up, looks at it, takes it over to the bin men. Consults with one of them. The binman, receptive, appreciative, holds it too, speaks to the young man.

Clock is too good to make it to the truck. Young man rests it on the pavement, where he and his friend will continue to sit.

They have colourful bags, a lot of them, that they sit on. It looks uncomfortable. Must be better than the tarmac pavement.

In my fridge I have quinoa, 2 eggs, a few blueberries, coconut milk, broccoli and hummus.

Nandoes, I think. Nandoes is across the road. Best get them a hearty meal than one fit for the seagulls that flock to them.

Nandoes won’t be open now, and they’ll have moved on by the time it is and I get there and back.

The amount of food we’ve had an excess of on this trip.

The amount of excess energy I’ve had to run along the promenade.

People line that same promenade, same colourful bags, different contents. Some sit down at beach level, leaning against the water defence wall for a break from the wind.

Yesterday I ran and went down to the beach level to stretch. A white man on a bike doubles back and says to me ‘excuse me, rather you stretch up here, there can be some funny characters that hang about down there’.

I stand at the window. Fifth floor in Seapoint, Cape Town, a partial view of the sea.

People are people.