Big boost for performing arts in City’s communities
17 September 2015
Joburg Theatre Youth Development will on Saturday September 19 launch the second-year level of the Applied Arts Management course in partnership with the Wits School of Arts.
The 10-week programme, a follow-up to last year’s successful introductory course, seeks to build the capacity of community-based youth organisations to enhance their funding and sustainability to support the social development work they do in their communities.
According to Nondumiso Sithole, Joburg Theatre’s acting Youth Development Manager, 49 graduates from last year’s first-level course have already confirmed their attendance of the course, which runs from September 26 to November 29.
“It’s a mix of male and female students from Diepsloot, Orange Farm, the Johannesburg CBD and other areas,” Sithole said.
Guided by a dozen course facilitators, the students will use the festival model to focus on a “process-orientated and collaborative approach to community-based theatre and applied performing arts for the purpose of social transformation”.
“This course is aimed at further demonstrating the significance of applied performing arts in the critical reflexive production of performance-based social development to address complex social realities specific to the local context. It is hoped that this course will continue to inspire community-based youth organisations to understand the critical role and responsibility of practitioners and managers,” she says.
The course will be presented at Joburg Theatre’s Space.com and at the Wits School of Arts on Mondays, Fridays and Saturdays. The creative sessions will be at the Joburg Theatre on Mondays, while Wits will host the technical sessions on Fridays. On Saturday mornings business classes will run at the Joburg Theatre and in the afternoons Wits Drama for Life will host the performance sessions.
The facilitators are Lonwabo Mavuso, Caryn Green, Lerato Bopane, Munyaradzi Chatikobo, Josias Dos Moleele, Refiloe Lepere, Benjamin Bell, Moses Rasekele, Cherae Halley, Tshego Khutsoane, Hlomohang “Spider” Mothetho and Tony Miyambo.
For more information email nondumiso@joburgtheatre.com or jae.titus@gmail.com.