Love in the Rain: Music, Memory and the Soft Defiance of Joy at NIROX Sculpture Park

Under a sky that threatened rain but never quite committed to grief, lovers gathered among stone and silence at the NIROX Sculpture Park. It was the day after Valentine’s Day—a time when love, already declared, grows quieter. Less performative. More real.

Blankets lay across damp grass, with couples leaning into each other for warmth. Wine glasses trembled slightly in the cold and then the music began.

The Concert for Love was never meant to exist as a single spectacle. It unfolded in the in-between spaces — between sculptures, between strangers, between notes held just long enough to feel like confession.

On stage, artists including Thando Zide, Internet Athi, Jabulile Majola and Mandisi Dyantyis did not simply perform; they offered fragments of themselves.

For Ivy van Bosch from Standard Bank, the afternoon was about more than entertainment.

“We’ve made our clients a promise to live a wealthier life. And part of a wealthier life is not just the financial aspect of it. It’s around… good experiences, making your time available to precious moments such as family and really the expression of the arts.”

Van Bosch framed the concert series not as spectacle, but as offering—time itself, repackaged as experience.

“Time is precious. So if you can give someone time with their loved ones, it really brings that commitment to life.”

She gestured toward the landscape — rolling lawns punctuated by sculptures that seemed to listen along.

“Look around you. This beautiful setting, it takes you away from the hustle and bustle of Johannesburg’s work. The landscapes, it’s just relaxing. It’s downtime. People are happy. And I think we all need that. Just a little bit of time out for ourselves to connect, to genuinely connect.”

Despite the gloomy weather, attendance held steady. Love, it seems, is resistant to inconvenience.

“I was anxious until I drove up to the parking and I saw all the flags and I saw all the cars. And when I walked in here and I saw the people and I heard the conversations… I’m very, very happy. It shows you, hey? People show up for love,” added Van Bosch.

Behind the scenes, Lloyd Anthony Smith, resident impresario and curator of NIROX’s musical programme, moved with quiet satisfaction. His role is less conductor than architect—assembling emotional structures from sound.

“I have the privilege of curating the music lineups here across various genres. Everything from blues and jazz to classical, traditional, contemporary.”

The Concert for Love forms part of a larger philosophy where NIROX does not merely host art—it cultivates it.

“NIROX’s sole purpose is to foster the arts… to be able to give a platform to these artists who are creating and producing such amazing music and to have them presented to an appreciative audience is a very special connection.”

That connection was visible everywhere. Emerging voices shared space with established names, their sounds blending without hierarchy.

“There’s no prevailing genre that takes center stage here. It really is just an expression of self in musical format. And I think, you know, that allows the grandest pastiche. So they just get to paint the skies for us and be enjoyed and appreciated and applauded,” Smith said.

He described the reception not with surprise, but with warmth.

“It’s really heartwarming and it sets the tone already. So by the time people arrive, it’s already a jubilation about the place and it just kind of builds and builds through the course of the day,” he added.

This concert did not compete with the noise of Johannesburg. It invited people away from it — into stillness, into presence, into each other.

By late afternoon, the air had shifted. The cold remained, but it no longer mattered. People lingered. Conversations deepened. The sculptures stood watch.

Written by: Lebohang Ndashe