JOMBA! breaks through barriers with dance
Cardiac Output will close this year’s JOMBA! Contemporary Dance Experience on Sunday, September 3 at 6pm at the Elizabeth Sneddon Theatre, UKZN.
FOUR young adults with Down Syndrome are blazing a new trail for dance in South Africa with their performance of Cardiac Output at this year’s 19th JOMBA! Contemporary Dance on Sunday, September 3 at 6pm.
The four dancers, Kevin Govender and Michaela Munro (both from Queensburgh), Charles Phillips (from Westville) Karl Hebbelmann (from Pinetown), auditioned earlier this year and have been working with Flatfoot dancers Thobile Maphanga, Sifiso Khumalo, Zihle Nzama and Jabu Siphika for the last five months.
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“We have been working with the Durban Down Syndrome Society to initially audition dancers for this work, but also in an endeavour to develop a relationship with dancers who are wanting to perform and create,” said Lliane Loots, the artistic director of JOMBA! and the Flatfoot Dance Company. “This is art project, not a therapy project. It is a project in which these dancers have made a commitment to making a profound piece of art. A meaningful work of art that can make a difference to us all.”
The choreography is done by Adriaan Luteijn, the artistic manager of INTRODANS’s educational department, Introdans Interactie. His work explores and extends the usual expectations of art by working with elderly dancers and autistic dancers.
Adriaan said that professional dancers learn so much about themselves and their artform by dancing with people who are differently-abled, and vice versa. “It is amazing to see how our guest dancers grow stronger in their self confidence, and, of course, the audience’s applause does the rest.”
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The medical term “cardiac output” is used for the amount of blood pumped through the heart per minute. The choreography is about matters of the human heart which can influence the cardiac output.
Cardiac Output will close this year’s JOMBA! Contemporary Dance Experience on Sunday, September 3 at 6pm at the Elizabeth Sneddon Theatre, UKZN.
Tickets are available at Computicket or at the door.
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