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Opulence was alive and well at this years’ Feather Awards. Dressed to the nines, the 11th annual LGBTIQ+ soirée brought together some of the most celebrated personalities and creators who have been making a splash across the country this year.
Heads were turned by Rich Mnisi, the designer who has been taking on runways across Europe and who was the mogul of the night.
From the minute he stepped off the not-so-red carpet there was not a moment when he wasn’t asked for a photo.
Strikingly dressed in all black and bejewelled, the winner of the Hunk of the Year category made the country proud after winning the Emerging Designer of the Year at the Essence Best in Black Fashion awards last month.
A celebrity fiesta in downtown Johannesburg was brewing as more and more well-known names and faces entered the venue, from Miss SA Zozibini Tunzi to celebrated media personality and newlywed Somizi Mhlongo, who remained under the radar as he refused photo requests.
Gqom queen Busiswa, winner of the Feather Musician award, arrived ready to give the audience a show-stopping performance.
Surprisingly, she was met with a room of seated people even though her dancers brought on the heat.
Perhaps the preshow socialising had depleted the attendees’ stamina.
Energies were elevated as the opening number by Buhle Bendalo called on the ancestors.
She paid tribute to the recent victims of femicide and gender-based violence whose photos and names were projected on the stage while she sang.
Hosts of the LGBTIQ+ community and allies were TV personalities Moshe Ndiki, Rami Chuene and Pabi Moloi, who followed the opening tribute with an elaborate and comical cover of the great Aretha Franklin’s 1967 hit, Respect, that kept everyone on their feet and highly entertained.
Best Styled Individual went to LootLove who was up against the futurist performer Manthe Ribane and artist Karabo Poppy.
Banyana Banyana striker Thembi Kgatlana took home the award for Sports Personality of the Year and from the celebratory response it was well deserved.
A heart-warming moment in the evening was felt when the winner of new category, Best Rainbow Parenting, Felicia Leqela, former YoTv presenter Lumko Johnson’s mother, said that as parents of children who are queer “we cannot chase them out of the house; we just need to love them”.
Recipient of the pristine African Feather of the Year award Linda Magano Baumann, a Namibian human rights and communications activist, captured our minds and heart with her poignant words of motivation for Africans to keep pushing the LGBTIQ+ rights movement until it had equality and freedom for all.
And, of course, the highlight of the occasion was when Judge Edwin Cameron, who has played a pivotal role in advancing the rights of queer people in South Africa during his period serving in the judiciary, received the Simon Nkoli award. Nkoli was an anti-apartheid, gay rights and Aids activist.
A moment was taken to honour Cameron, the former Justice of the Constitutional Court, whose fellow activists shared how Cameron’s activism as an openly gay man who is living with HIV, has inspired so many people across the spectrum of age, race, gender and sexual orientation in the movement for equal freedom in the country.
The Mzansi Gay Choir gave thanks to the award winner with a beautiful rendition of the iconic Labi Siffre song, Something Inside So Strong, raising spirits across the room.
Besides the irony of award presenters welcoming the audience at an LGBTIQ+ event with gender binary and exclusionary language, such as “ladies and gentlemen”, the evening was filled with high energy and hope for a more inclusionary humanity.
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