Is dance finding its feet?

The reckoning sight of people euphorically dancing in the drizzling rain, selflessly letting go of themselves and celebrating their culture in dance, opened the first night of Dance Week Festival Uganda 2015. It revitalised why dance is marking its place in the arts industry, and reason it still dominates communal or social occasions to-date.

This year’s festival gathered dancers and enthusiasts from across Africa and Europe, bringing together several dancers, genres, choreographers, innovations and stories that enrich our historical and cultural heritage as a country and continent at large. Performances from Kenya, Rwanda, Benin, Tanzania, South Africa and Uganda were showcased.

Kenya’s Pamoja Dance Group, despite physical impairment, danced their souls out on stage. Popular dance group TabuFlo impressed as always and duets such as Rachelle Sloss (Spain) and Hamuza Primo’s Me and You left romantic ballet perfection on stage.

“Dance Week is one of the first arts festivals that inspired several more, yet does not entirely rely on donors but on selling artists to the market,” a zealous Julius Lugaaya intimates. After several travels and art residences abroad, Lugaaya decided in 2003 to start a dance festival as a means of reaching out to people in the arts; those awaiting opportunities of employment within the industry and for those passionate about dance.

The number of Ugandans taking dance classes has risen as alternative for fun and socalisation, but also its rich benefits like keeping the body, heart and brain active and healthy, improved strength and flexibility for muscles and joints, have made it popular.

In a year at the Uganda National Cultural Centre (National Theatre), there are about 76 dance-related performances. Lugaaya attributes this to the great deal of energy, commitment and networking that artists have, and because in the region, Uganda has an upper hand with Makerere University, which teaches Performing Arts, but also the famous Namasaggali College for its adoption of several art forms.

Growing industry
Jasmine Juruga Namutosi has been dancing professionally for six years. Her perception of the industry is that it is now growing as people can now make money from their craft, and “it’s not a guy thing anymore- only testosterone” or strictly for white audiences. However, she is positive that stake holders such as dance companies, choreographers, and festivals’ founders are doing the industry justice by pushing for professionalism.

Earning for a dancer depends on how they want to survive. However, Lillian Nabaggala of Batalo East dance group insists if a dancer wants to earn, then they ought to give people a reason to want to watch them. “Follow a promoter’s theme and blend in your creativity,” she says. They either take up mainstream entertainment, community dance outreach, teaching in schools, or perform at parties.

Uganda boasts of exchanges with the international community, such as 20 dance majors from New York are switched for the equivalent from Uganda, and currently, two Ugandans are in Norway under a dance programme. ( give us actual figures of earnings)

No different from Uganda, Fana Tshabalala, a South African choreographer, argues that dance in South Africa is slowly growing and finding ground. He says there are hardly funders or platforms. They just use what is at their disposal. Lugaaya, though, notes that what we lack as Uganda is time, chance and commitment.
“Systems for dance to direct one where to go if they want to dance, what levels and what happens where is all we require to guide, protect and moderate the industry because here, anyone comes in and goes at will,” he speaks solidly.

High turn-up
The festival received massive support from the audience that attended, but also the Uganda National Cultural Centre for space and agencies such as Alliance Francaise. Performances indulged poetry, themes of Rwanda genocide, child soldiers, abortion and pregnancy, integrity, and Latin Flavours’ contemporary dance piece “The Birth” by Samuel Ibanda, which depicted female genitalia in such an artistically appreciative way.

Some of the Performances

BEHIND THE CURTAIN,
By Marcel Gbeffa, Benin

Within the audience, you could hear sighs and the sniffing of sobbing faces as Gbeffa’s dance piece progressed. Performed with such emotional explosion, sharp-neat angles as he flexed thigh and arm muscle; this dancer/choreographer, associated with Compagnie Multicorps group, carried us away into movement describing struggles, brokenness and survival. “The piece talks about the artist and their art, the difficulty he meets before delivering works to the public ” explained Gbeffa.

THE CHASE, by Lillian Nabaggala and Key Drichiru

If female credit in the dance revolution is anything to mark, these two brought a B.Boy-contemporary fusion to the stage. While Drichiru popped and locked, spinned on her head and flipped baby poses with legs mid-air, Nabaggala vogued (twisting fast hand motion), entwined salsa steps and fused graceful Kinyarwanda dance. Their choreography centered round a table to which they hang, crawled about and fought for, closing the performance with an illuminated figure in the dark.

BETWEEN US, By Fana Tshabalala, South Africa

This routine was a thriving show of Zulu potency, agility, speed, and their thigh high-jumping technique. Bopping to South African house music and its mystifying beats, Tshabalala and his dance partner Tulani Showek were in sync. Costumed in khaki shorts, shirts and geeky glasses, they gave the dance a mirror effect of one imitating the other. The choreography was heightening for excitement, infused with comic motion and the illusion of a battle which, given their physique, reminded many of Tshaka Zulu’s battles of conquest.

ALTERNATIVE DANCE, By Desire Tereka

This closing performance of the night had an eerie and goth aura that surrounded the form. In the dark and shadowy lighting, Rashida Namulondo hang to ropes at the centre of the stage, while Yutta Convicts’ Tereka performed a dance ritual. “It is not the usual dance genre that follows technique. Rather it is meant to unravel emotional dancing, incorporated with different objects (gourds, smoke and ash) as though in a ritual. We all follow certain rituals, be it washing hands after meals or particular religious rituals” Tereka.