KASSIE NAIDOO
TEAM CAPTAIN
Kassie Naidoo built her career as a creative director over 3 decades ago, expressing her creative leadership through design, creative direction and creative strategy. She began her career in editorial design, but changed lanes many times over, thus garnering a wide work experience that saw her heading up brand design teams to herding creatives in leading advertising and design agencies. Kassie’s approach is highly collaborative, loving the energy of working with both large and small teams. She is not afraid of taking risks or trying to do something that’s never been done before, which in the past has given many of her production managers sleepless nights. With an eye for detail and strategic creative mind, Kassie’s work combines intuition with insight and experience.
In 2019 Kassie joined Lampost Productions as partner and creative director, wanting to play her role in Africa’s visual storytelling culture. They successfully launched Lampost Luminaries in 2020, a fellowship aimed at transforming the photography /motion industry to have more visual stories headed by African creative women.
Today, Kassie divides her time between Lampost, Daily Maverick 168 (art-director-at-large) and a few niche local as well as global clients choosing to work with brands that are driving positive social change in a post-covid world.
JODIE ENNIK
TEAM LEADER
Jodie Ennik is a highly respected contributor in many areas of the fashion and advertising industries both locally and globally as well as the founder of premier women-led creative management and full service production companies Lampost and LUSTRE.
Photography is a major love for Jodie, having spent most of her career working alongside and with photographers on editorial as well as commercial campaigns. She has spent countless hours supporting young photographic talent to grow into masters of their craft whilst building South Africa’s reputation as a sought-after destination for talent and production management.
As creator of the Rise Creative Mentorship Program, Jodie’s passion for sharing knowledge and upskilling photographers was solidified, thus in late 2019, along with her co-founders Lampost Luminaries was born.
LESEDI MOTHOAGAE
TEAM LEADER
Lesedi Mothoagae was awarded best visual techniques in his final year of Multimedia Technology Design at the University of Johannesburg in 2016 but his love for telling stories through visuals of the people he encountered growing up in Soweto led him to pick up a camera after graduating.
He worked his way up from assisting South African photographers he loved and respected to shooting commercial campaigns in a few short years. Today Lesedi has a few local and global commercial campaigns under his belt as well as having stepped into the film space on commercial campaigns.
His deeply collaborative process and respect for his subjects, makes him a truly exceptional storyteller of the trials and triumphs of township life and big city aspirations of a young country.
ROSS GARRETT
TEAM CURATOR
Ross started his career as a Graphic Designer and shortly after leaving college, he founded a full service digital design agency, Injozi, specializing in both above and below-the-line marketing. It was here that his love for creating images began. Working as a fashion and advertising photographer, Ross harnessed a unique perspective, having studied design before forging a path in photography, that had his work featured in international publications such as V Magazine, Numéro, Dazed & Confused, Marie Claire, Elle, whilst his Advertising pursuits saw him work for brands like Johnnie Walker, Perrier and Nike.
It was in 2014 that Ross joined Darling Films as a Commercials Director. His strong visual aesthetic has seen him become a sort-after Director, he has since worked on major South African and International brands such as Johnnie Walker, VW, Jameson, Ford and won International awards for The Joburg Ballet including Cannes, One show, Clios, D&AD and Webbys awards.
SHELLEY CHRISTIANS
TEAM CURATOR
The highlight of my career so far has been to be left alone in a room with Nelson Mandela at the age of 20, to photograph him for the publication I was working on. My work in media has meant that I have had the privilege to photograph some iconic South Africans, including Archbishop Desmond Tutu.
THE photographer in me was born when I was a high school student, studying with George Hallet. There was no doubt about it; for the rest of my life I would be looking through a lens. And thus I decided to study photography and obtained a Btech Degree at CPUT.
My career path started at a multi-media company, running the photographic department as well as shooting. Thereafter I did a stint with a wildlife photographer. These two jobs were critical to laying the foundation for my career in photojournalism, giving me the experience and exposure to shoot everyone from the community collecting plastic on beaches to presidents.
MOGAU KEKANA
TEAM CURATOR
Mogau Kekana is a young visual developer and film director from inner-city Johannesburg. His work can be described as both contemporary and afrocentric as it is mostly inspired by the stories, cultures and aesthetics he grew up around in a multi-layered and often complex country. His latest works are featured in the 1st African animated Netflix series “Super Team 4′ as well as Disney’s African animated anthology series “Kizazi Moto” generation fire. Kekana won a BAFTA Students Award in the animation category this year for his short film “Thaba Ye” which means This Mountain in Sepedi.