Projects and Intwasa Arts Festival Build Up 2011

Intwasa means Spring – a season for new life, new beginnings, joy and fun. Spring is a season for blooming. A season for opening up and flourishing. A season in bloom exudes energy and radiates diversity. Blooming reflects freshness, vigour, and youthfulness. This is exactly what the 8th edition of Intwasa Arts festival will be about.

It will be about growing and opening up to new audiences, acts, and artists; opening up and embracing both the old and the new, the known and the unknown, local and international. It will be about encouraging intersections between the arts, business and other sectors; growing...More

OUR PROJECTS

March 2011

Photography Workshop

The workshop will select 20 young and aspiring photographers to go through a two day practical photography workshop. The workshop will focus on photography as an art form. After the two days the 20 participants shall be given an assignment to come up with a portfolio of five very expressive photographs. Fifty (50) of the photos shall be selected to be exhibited with poems from accomplished writers/poets during the festival in September.

April 2011

Variety Show

The variety show will kick start Intwasa’s audience building activities and build up to the September festival. The variety show will be in line with the festival’s objective of encouraging collaborations and putting different genres under one roof. The show will have poetry, dance, comedy, theatre. The event will be held at Stanley Hall. The venue will be one of the venues for the festival and having shows at this venue prior to the festival will help the public get used to the idea going for performance at the venue. The festival will also use the show to collect audience information for later use.

April 2011

World Dance Day Celebrations

Dancers and dance groups in Bulawayo will converge to commemorate World Dance Day which is celebrated on 27 April each year. Intwasa will hold a dance competition for different forms of dance ranging from traditional, contemporary hip-hop etc. Individual dancers and dance groups will be invited to participate at the competition and the best participants will be awarded prizes. The completion will be held at Njube Hall as a way of taking Intwasa activities to the communities and away from the city centre.

May 2011

Power in the Voice (Schools Poetry)

The Primary Schools leg of the Power in the Voice poetry completion will kick off. Again Stanley Hall and Bulawayo Theatre will be used as venues in an effort to keep the public aware of the venues that will be used later during the festival. Schools will be invited hold mini competitions in their schools where Intwasa will then chose performers for the Power in the Voice project. The best performers will then be entered into the competition. A panel of adjudicators will be chosen to determine the overall results of the competition. The finals of this competition will held during Intwasa festival..

June 2011

Poetry Writing and Performance Workshop

The workshop is mainly for young poets in schools. The 40 participants shall be taken from the Power in the Voice project. 40 young poets who qualify for Power in the Voice Semi- Finals shall undergo a one - day training in writing and poetry performance in preparation for the semi-finals in July and Finals in September during the festival. Two established and well known poets shall be contracted to conduct the workshop. The workshop shall focus on both Isindebele and English.

September 2011

Power in the Voice (Finals)

Poetry has always been a major activity in schools both at Primary and Secondary School. In 2007 the poetry competition was a major highlight during Intwasa Arts Festival koBulawayo. The competition is back ably supported by the National Youth Development Trust (NYDT). The 2011 edition saw 15 poets battle it out for a place in the finals with only ten talented poets impressing the judges and making it to the finals. The ten poets will go through writing and poetry performance workshop facilitated by renowned poets and performers before they clash on the 20th September 2011 during the festival.

The Intwasa Short Story Competition 2011

The Intwasa Short Story Competition is an annual literary event seeking to promote original creative writing talent in both English and Isindebele. The competition has two awards; the Yvonne Vera award for best short story in English and the N. S. Sigogo award for best short story in isindebele. The prize for each award will be $500.

The English Award is named after the late Dr. Yvonne Vera who is arguable one of the best writers writing in English to emerge out of Bulawayo and Zimbabwe as a whole. The Ndebele award is named after Ndabezinhle S. Sigogo. Mr. N. S. Sigogo was a prolific writer and probably the most published Ndebele writer with over two dozen publication to his name.

There were 202 entries for all categories. 104 entries for the Yvonne Vera award for Seniors. 35 entries for the Junior Category. 34 entries for the N. S. Sigogo award for Seniors. 31 Entries for the junior category.