Mariechen is a freelance musician and teacher from Cape Town. Until recently, she has only considered herself to be a classical double bassist by profession, as that was what she studied and trained for. Throughout the lockdown period, she participated in many different online double bass lessons, masterclasses, and summits. Attending these virtual international platforms, she felt inspired and connected, regardless of the distance. At some point something just clicked, and she asked herself: ‘Why not South Africa?’
Read moreMutual Support, Grassroots Collaboration, and Building Community
Taiji comes from Clovelly, a beautiful seaside town with dramatic mountain views in the south western side of Cape Town, South Africa. At the beginning of April, he and a few of neighbours decided to start a Community Action Network (CAN). ‘My aim is to connect people. All people have value. We all have something to offer to our communities. Sadly, oftentimes we become so lonely and caught up in our personal lives. We think, “I don't have time to be involved in the community.” But I think that community is about mutual support.
Read moreThe Roles of the Arts during COVID-19 Pandemic Lockdown in Nigeria: Music, Nigerian Films, and Visual Arts
As part of its findings, the study shows that the majority of respondents from Nigeria resorted to using different art forms during the lockdown to assuage loneliness, depression, and boredom. These art forms include music, dance aerobics, visual arts expressions such as painting, sculpting, and ceramics. Simultaneously, the majority relied on the Nigerian film industry known as Nollywood for its cross-cultural heritage and entertainment transmissions.
Read moreThe Nose Mask Entrepreneurship of Women Creatives in Calabar
The producing and enforcing the use of nose masks has had a most unintended consequence in the city of Calabar. Dozens of young creative people, whose livelihoods were “taken away” by the pandemic, are now making income from the same masks instituted to keep the virus out.
Read moreThe Theatre of Unsustainable Goals
In 2019, I had the ambivalent privilege to serve as an artist-in-residence at the University of Pretoria in South Africa’s capital city. Ambivalent for, on the one-hand, I would have six months of paid work and free accommodation, but, on the other hand, I was required to write a play about the United Nation’s Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs)!
Read more