Baxter dance fest still going strong
IT IS no mean feat to keep arts companies alive today, let alone festivals, so it is heartening to receive news of the eighth Baxter Dance Festival. Using funding from the National Lottery Distribution Trust Fund, the Baxter launched a one-off dance festival in 2005 — and has kept it going.
Nicolette Moses, associate producer and planning manager for the festival, says: “The event has become too important within the dance community of the Western Cape not to stage it annually. We have been fortunate to have the unwavering support, since the first festival, of the Lorenzo and Stella Chiappini Charitable and Cultural Trust.”
The festival offers almost 50 choreographers the opportunity to showcase their work and combines a mix of established professionals and emerging or relatively new dance makers from the Western Cape. Moses has also sourced work that has had outings at the National Arts Festival, Dance Umbrella and Jomba!.
Invited works include Vuyani Dance Theatre in Gregory Maqoma’s superb work, Mayhem; and Luyanda Sidiya’s Umnikelo (Offering), both offering high quality theatre dance. Maqoma’s Mayhem reflects the confusion in which we find ourselves today — an altered state of consciousness that leads to madness and a sense of being lost. Sidiya’s work takes inspiration from his connection to the ancestors; it is deeply spiritual and uses a particular choreographic signature, which draws on Sylvia Glasser’s Afro-fusion.
Ananda Fuchs, a former Siwela Sonke and Jazzart Dance Theatre member and now a freelance choreographer and dance teacher, has been commissioned to create a new work for the festival — Fragile Falling. It will appear nightly on the main programme, alongside companies such as Underground Dance Theatre, Wilvan School of Dance, Jazzart Dance Theatre, Cape Dance Company, Ikapa Dance Theatre and Brigitte Reeve Dance Company.
Former Alvin Ailey dancer Bradley Shelver will also feature with Healing Song. Gautengbased Yuhl Headman from Sibikwa Arts Dance Company features with Internal Findings, and Themba Mbuli brings his Dark Cell. Alfred Hinkel’s Bruin comes from his Garage dance company based in Oukiep in the Northern Cape.
The Off Main programme is on October 6 and features emerging choreographers such as Lisa Wilson from UCT School of Dance with her Ancestral Whisperings; Mishkaah Medell and Enricho Solomons from the EOAN Group Theatre Company and Byron Klassen from Hinkel’s Garage company.
The Fringe Programme is on October 13 and includes work by youth groups, dance studios, school groups and traditional African dance groups.
Baxter Dance Festival, Baxter Theatre, until October 13, (021) 685 7880, www.baxter.co.za