I am a young gay man (23 in fact) from Durban who now currently resides in Cape Town. I first came to Cape Town to study Live Performance and Motion picture medium aka – performance for stage and TV. I had always been a creative at heart, having acted and sang in many school productions and a few professional musical productions as well.
After some good advice from a close friend, some thinking and the disillusionment felt after a year at AFDA, I decided to pursue something I am just as passionate about but overlooked. I studied two years 3D Animation at The Animation School here in Cape Town. Since I first arrived in Cape Town in 2005, I have worked as a barman at Cruz (Closed now), Bronx and most recently dancing at Crew. Subsequently I have worked a year at a production studio as an Editor, Compositor, Colorist and Grader and DIT.
I have had a rather up and down year to be honest, I want to keep this brief so wont go into detail, but pretty much lost my job and had a series of unfortunate events happen the week after winning the Pink Loerie Mardi Gras this year in Knysna. It has been tough but I have grown so much from the experience, they say that pain is the best teacher. I guess it is.
I have now found a job at one of the top animation studios in the country doing VFX (think lord of the rings), I make dreams reality, the impossible possible – I love what I do
After some good advice from a close friend, some thinking and the disillusionment felt after a year at AFDA, I decided to pursue something I am just as passionate about but overlooked. I studied two years 3D Animation at The Animation School here in Cape Town. Since I first arrived in Cape Town in 2005, I have worked as a barman at Cruz (Closed now), Bronx and most recently dancing at Crew. Subsequently I have worked a year at a production studio as an Editor, Compositor, Colorist and Grader and DIT.
I have had a rather up and down year to be honest, I want to keep this brief so wont go into detail, but pretty much lost my job and had a series of unfortunate events happen the week after winning the Pink Loerie Mardi Gras this year in Knysna. It has been tough but I have grown so much from the experience, they say that pain is the best teacher. I guess it is.
I have now found a job at one of the top animation studios in the country doing VFX (think lord of the rings), I make dreams reality, the impossible possible – I love what I do
Since becoming a finalist in the Mr Gay South Africa™ I've had to ask myself questions about what winning the competition means to me, as an individual and as a gay man. I have come to realize that this is so much more than just a beauty pageant but that is to be discussed in a coming up blog entry – for now I want to keep it short and sweet, and hungry for more!
I also plan to discuss certain gay issues that I feel need to talked about generally, especially after I did the interview for news24. The comments I got were generally positive and was amazed at the level of support, what also amazed although disgusted me was how many people went out of their way to make assumptions about someone they don't even know based on their sexuality, making brash unfounded, statements all the while imposing their ideals or beliefs on people who couldn't care to listen. I didn't comment to any of it because I felt no need to dignify any of it. It was a long and difficult journey to get to the man I am today, and I know many gay men have had to go through a lot to just be themselves, just to know themselves.
Those comments have given me quite a bit of material to work with, if you havent seen the interview you can go read it here:
http://www.gotravel24.com/theme/feature-focus/meet-mr-mardi-gras
Until next time (and I mean soon)
Cheers!
Chris Macgregor
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