Local voices reflecting our world
Community and a host of talented artists willing to uncover and probe painful pasts. By
or not. Schools in the area serve as campsites, which helps stretch the budget.
A full hall of learners from nearby towns escaped their devices for about an hour watching plays such as the remarkable Fietsry vir Dommies (Cycling for Dummies) and Rooilug (Red Air).
And, by the way, young people all speak fluent “tannie” in Oudtshoorn, including the parking attendants.
Transcending language
Though the bulk of work at the festival remains in Afrikaans, there are many English-language offerings, including Van Graan’s remarkable touring piece, My Fellow South Africans, with Kim Blanché Adonis.
Stand-up comedy this year featured Marc Lottering, Tollie Parton, Yaaseen Barnes, Stuart Taylor, Alfred Adriaan, Ambrose Uren, Conrad Koch, Dalin Oliver, Melanie du Toit, KG Mokgadi, Kate Pinchuck and Lindy Johnson.
What was remarkably evident in the Afrikaans-language texts was the deep excavation of pain and intergenerational wounding. It was not a pain born of rage or anger, but a pain born of acceptance, a confrontation with the self and history, and then finally a realisation that, to move forward, these ghosts must be confronted.
Stage phenomenon Sandra Prinsloo featured in three major productions. In Op die Hoek van Styx en River Is Nora per Abuis met die Dood Oorgeslaan (translated as Nora Finds Herself Between Life and Death), she plays a woman whose husband has died “on the border”, or so she thinks.
This is once again a text – by Henque Heymans and directed by Toni Morkel – about loss, pain and acceptance. Nora (Prinsloo) has lost a son and a husband and must make a choice when she finds herself in farcical purgatory.
David Viviers plays a series of bureaucratic guides in this stage of the afterlife as she navigates her way in the liminal space. It is hilarious and sore all at the same time.
Prior to the show, performed in a South African National Defence Force hall, I was photographing an old “buffel”, or armoured vehicle, with a red cross parked behind the venue. A man, white, neatly dressed, in his mid-60s stood next to me doing the same.
“These are the same vehicles we used on the border. A lot of young men were resuscitated in them,” he remarked.
And then, without rancour or anger he added: “They fucked me up.”
Look up and outwards
In Goed wat Wag om te Gebeur (Things that Are Waiting to Happen), a young man, Hendrik (Gideon Lombard), returns to his childhood home to excavate deep and painful memories that will not be exorcised.
There he encounters a shell of his mother (Antoinette Kellerman), his sister, and a former wife (Emma Kotze).
For the man I encountered at the military ambulance, this must have been searing to watch. Yet here he was, collectively experiencing a past many carry with them and have not shared.
Van Graan wrote in 2019 about the then Department of Arts and Culture, which had a budget of R4.6-billion for that year: “There is money for the arts and culture sector (and this is besides funding from other tiers of government, private-sector sponsorship, international donors and the National Lotteries Commission). There is phenomenal talent, and citizens throughout the country, no matter their income, have a right to experience and have their lives bettered by having access to the excellent theatre, dance, music and other art forms.
“All that is required now is vision, political will and a real commitment from the government to work with credible civil society structures in making this happen.”
Sadly, as elsewhere in South African life, citizens are doing it for themselves. For now. With the help of generous sponsors that keep the arts alive. But the reach and impact on the cultural economy and employment could be so much greater if all of this were understood deeply by politicians.
As Mahomed said, this should be a national initiative that could be expanded across the country. Imagine then, if our rail network is restored and towns become more accessible and cheaper to reach.
Many of us who attended this year’s festival wondered where those South Africans who only speak English go to find direction, to check the pulse of fellow citizens.
And what about other official languages and what can be mined there? Imagine it!
Festivals such as the KKNK, the National Arts Festival, Aardklop in Potchefstroom, the Woordfees in Stellenbosch, the Kalfiefees in Hermanus and several others provide a lifeline to artists and culture in this country. The benefits are there for all to see.