Kate Stafford on a visit she and Amy Bonsall had to the Afrovibes Festival
Amsterdam, early October 2015.
We are sitting in the upstairs room of a lovely theatre, the Compagnietheater. Everywhere the Afrovibes Festival roars around us - in the few days we have been here we have been in a maelstrom of intercultural performance. We have seen high energy, urban dance, Afrikaans/English rap; verbatim theatre documenting South Africa’s recent upsurge in xenophobic violence and some wonderful clowning. There are visual art exhibitions, performances in English, Dutch and Xhosa and lively discussions with artists from hugely diverse backgrounds.
But now we are meeting with the organisers of this festival, to talk about bringing our production of Brothers in Blood to Afrovibes 2016. And the opening remarks? “I saw a pitch for this play in South Africa some time ago. I didn’t like it”.
Oh dear. But I am hear to report, gentle reader, that by the end of the meeting we are pretty much agreed - the Bilimankhwe-UK Arts co-production of Brothers in Blood by Mike Van Graan, directed by Amy Bonsall, will be performed in Amsterdam next Autumn. Our show will be current, exciting, dynamic and explosive and we managed to blow away the memories of whoever that other company was that pitched the play so badly!
London, mid October 2015
So back in London the work begins. We must put together the UK tour, apply for funding and do all the other production work in order to make this happen. I am sitting at my computer procrastinating when a notification pings. Brett Bailey has sent an update from Rio:
‘Shit hit the fan last night here in Rio, when a debate around Exhibit B and associated issues was taken over by shouting, furious members of the audience. no debate. no discussion. A huge amount of anger and frustration and absolute fed-upness with the injustice dealt to black society in this country which saw the import of 4.9 million slaves, in which racial inequality is rivaled only by South Africa, in which police brutality towards black people gets scant notice, and around 77% of the victims of all homicides are black youths. All this got focused on me and the festival which intends to host the work next year. Again I'm a racist motherfucker.
As regular readers of this blog will know, I saw Exhibit B in Paris last year, and think it is an extraordinary work of extreme power. I would be sad to see it cancelled again - but let me post this response from Ismail Mohamed, the Artistic Director of the National Arts Festival in Grahamstown, South Africa, as he says it so much more eloquently than I can:
'As the Artistic Director of the National Arts Festival I engaged with the proposal for this production for a long while when it landed on my desk. My initial response to the proposal was hugely negative. I engaged privately for long hours about how a White artist would be appropriating history and pain of the "other". I was concerned that the work would make an exotic museum piece of the "other". I thought of almost every single reason that has been presented by those who are determined to prevent the work from being staged. After days of contemplation, I decided that despite all my concerns the work needed to be staged. I knew that it would evoke pain. I knew that it would stir guilt. I was prepared for any anger that it might unleash. When it was staged it did evoke all those emotions and much more. It made White audiences feel guilt, remorse and even anger for the pain, humiliation and destruction that their forefathers brought to Africa. It gave White audiences an opportunity to cry and to look at the first "other" person they saw in that "theatre" with a deep sense of humility. The work gave Black audiences a spiritual connection with their past and an opportunity to feel affirmed that the struggle is still far from over. There were audiences who also hated the work; and they had every right to do so. The purpose of presenting good art is not to make the artist feel loved. It is to push the artist out there from our comfort zones and to stir us from our inertia. To unearth those bottled emotions. To play havoc with our minds. To push us into those dark spaces that we hope will get forgotten. To let us walk on our own way and to inspire us with the energy to triumphantly celebrate the human spirit. To leave us for days on end pondering, questioning, confused and arguing with ourselves, the artist and the art. EXHIBIT B did all of that in Grahamstown. For that reason alone I would stage the work again and again and again.'
To which Brett replied: “thanks, Ismail”. Yes, thanks Ismail, for standing up against the shouting and furious rage, and expressing what many of us feel.
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