UJ Arts & Culture is geared up to present its usual heady mix of bold, provocative, contemporary and world-class performances at this year’s National Arts Festival (Naf).
Head of Arts and Culture, Ashraf Johaardien said for the first time at Naf, the highly accomplished UJ Choir is set to spellbind its audience with a programme of African vocal music that won them the Grand Prix Prize at the Bratislava Folk Music Festival in 2015. “It’s really great to be on the main programme for the second time since I’ve been at UJ,” said Johaardien. The Choir is set to perform music from heavyweight contemporary composers such as Knut Nystedt, Jake Runestad, Richards Dubra and Paul Mealor, as well as some older gems and covers.
Festinos can also look forward to Ntozake Shange’s, For coloured girls who have considered suicide/ when the rainbow is enuf – a UJ Arts & Culture student production from the Fringe programme at the festival, directed by Khutjo Bakunzi-Green, choreographed by Kieron Jina and designed by Jade Bowers and Camille Behrens. This extended ‘choreopoem’ tells the stories of seven women with subjects ranging from rape and abortion to domestic violence and abandonment. The play weaves their interconnected stories of love, empowerment, struggle and loss into a complex representation of sisterhood.
This year’s Standard Bank Young Artist award-winner, Bowers, has been a UJ Arts & Culture associate director for several years. For this year’s Naf she will be directing Scorched by acclaimed Lebanese-Canadian playwright Wajdi Mouawad. The play explores the nuances of identity and difference beyond the simple black-white binary of South Africa’s apartheid past, and will debut in Johannesburg at the UJ Arts Centre following the festival.
Details: UJ Arts and Culture, 011 559 4555.
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