UBOM! EASTERN CAPE DRAMA COMPANY

Ubom! was established in 2003 under the Artistic Direction of Janet Buckland. The company draws together skills of local community professionals with university graduates. This combination places it in a unique position to contribute to the development of an Eastern Cape cultural identity. The company is deeply committed to social development, and its achievements in this arena have recently been acknowledged through a Gold Impumelelo Innovations Award (May 2008), and through Janet Buckland’s success in winning the Shoprite/Checkers Woman of the Year Award (2008), and recognition by Makana Municipality for development and upliftment of people in the Makana Municipal area and beyond. Whilst focusing on social development the company continues to maintain a high degree of artistic professionalism and integrity, and strives to produce works that are both relevant and cutting-edge.

Ubom! Eastern Cape Drama Company is a non-profit organisation that aims to develop, grow, and maintain a thriving arts environment in the Eastern Cape Province of South Africa. We work to develop audiences, community groups and professionals in the area, creating performances that are dynamic, relevant, accessible, taboo-breaking and of the highest theatrical calibre. While our focus remains on local communities our products are widely implemented in the broader South African context, in which they form part of our initiative to facilitate community upliftment, and behavioural change.

A further aim of the organisation is to create ongoing employment opportunities for local practitioners form diverse backgrounds. We pride ourselves on being one of the most culturally and socio-economically diverse theatre companies in South Africa today. Ubom! aspires to function as a living model of transformation in a country that remains plagued by inequality, social division and intolerance.

Since its inception in 2003, Ubom!’s primary objective has been to give disadvantaged communities access to theatre performances and arts activities. Its interactive and participatory intervention style has grappled with a variety of pressing social and environmental challenges (ranging from HIV/AIDS, racism and gender issues to the crisis of global climate change).

EASTERN CAPE ARTS INDUSTRY NEEDS AND TREND

The theatre industry in the Eastern Cape is in need of much stimulation and development. Because the apartheid dispensation allowed the impetus for theatre in the Eastern Cape to come from the Western Cape, the evolution of professional Eastern Cape theatre with its own unique identity and regional concerns has been inhibited.

The Square Root of DreamingThe project has as its main focus, the implementation of a theatre & workshop programme & the management of vital projects, all of which aim to stimulate the arts environment in a multiplicity of ways and to significantly boost the reputation of the arts industry in the Eastern Cape.

PROJECTS TO DATE

The company works to make its productions accessible to persons from all socio-economic backgrounds, taking theatre into far-flung communities, performing in any space (ranging from state of the art theatres to community halls, school courtyards, sports fields, animal enclosures and pieces of grass) and charging little or nothing for its performances. Ongoing surveys and anecdotal evidence suggests that we have come a long way in achieving our goal of developing an appreciation of the power and joy of theatre throughout the country.

With the financial support from the NLDTF, the NAC, and Rhodes University, Ubom! has served the community by implementing a Community Arts Programme which continues to• address ‘poverty’ within the community when poverty refers to a lack of resources and access to the arts;• upgrade performance skills to increase employability of disadvantaged arts practitioners; • develop the feasibility of the arts as a career choice and promote this idea;• celebrate the creative human spirit; • provoke debate, analysis and the search for solutions; • encourage the exploration of personal creativity and potential; • have voices heard that would otherwise have stayed marginalized;• holistically develop the younger generation through arts-related activities which provide the youth with a means to develop their potential and creative self expression;• conscientise the youth to pressing social and environmental challenges through workshops & participative theatre.

VUKA DRAMA WORKSHOPS

Vuka Workshops are an on-going programme of drama workshops in various township schools and the Grahamstown prison

Weekly workshops

are run with learners at Ntaba Maria Church Hall, CM Vellum school classroom and the St. Mary’s Day Care centre. These workshops aim to introduce learners to the basic skills of collaborative performance and theatre making.The workshops emphasise the exploration of creative expression through the experimentation with group dynamics and ensemble improvisation to create a theatre event which is performed at the end of the year as part of the Makana Drama Development Festival.

Grahamstown Correctional Centre Prison Workshops:

Prisoners’ Workshops: These workshops encourage creativity and positively develop expressive potential in the participants. The idea is to contribute towards their creative rehabilitation.The workshops work towards the presentation of a theatre event. In April 2010, inmates who are workshopped weekly at Grahamstown Correctional Facility were entered into the Eastern Cape Eisteddfod. This was an especially momentous event, as Applied Theatre expert Alex Sutherland and Ubom! orchestrated the adjudicators to go to the prison itself where the prisoners wowed them with group and individual drama set works. Results of a very high standard were achieved, with Double Gold, Gold, and Silver awards being handed out at the end of the event

MAKANA DRAMA DEVELOPMENT FESTIVAL

Makana Drama Development Festival Workshops: These are intensive full day workshops, and are held for around 50 community arts practitioners. They are facilitated by a number of Rhodes University Drama Department lecturers, and Ubom! company actors/facilitators. The workshops set out to expose the participants to various theatre production skills with the aim of upgrading their directing, acting, and general theatre making skills. Towards the end of October the arts practitioners present productions for the Makana Drama Development Festival to be held at Rhodes University.
The Festival: Ubom! Eastern Cape Drama Company organises and runs a Makana Drama Development Festival for community artists & schools. We facilitate workshops, rehearsals, staging and performances of six to eight theatre works per section, which are adjudicated in the Festival.
Up-skilling workshops (directing, lighting, performance, rehearsal, and production management skills) are also run with disadvantaged local community drama groups culminating in a local festival which is run in the Rhodes University Theatre – thus exposing community groups to state of the art theatre tools.

MDDF workshops have elicited wonderful feedback from participants e.g.:
“Overall the workshop was very useful as we were equipped with good exercises both for actors and directors/writers. We can also benefit more if the dates can be extended, Thank you!”
(Zonwabele Zenani – Sakh’ubuntu)
In response to the question: Which section of the workshop did you find the most useful and why?
“It is the directing and how to use the space on stage and how to work with a group, because in theatre it is not about you but to work as a team.” (Ayanda Nondlwana, Gtn Pantsula)
“The one was led by Prof Buckland which helped us to be part of audience while you are acting, and also understand the rhyme of theatre you are in. (Zwelinzima Somyali, Acapella)
Follow up workshops focus on performance skills and development of them with the directors present to experience the specific tools used to rehearse actors; training them to listen and understand what is needed for the highest standards of performance technique.

The final event sees a competition night where groups selected to partake in the MDDF have their chance to showcase their work. We believe that the element of competition amongst the groups has raised the standard of the productions as well as making for good entertainment. The use of the University facilities exposes the groups to working with lighting and stage management resources. This festival has not only benefited the dramatists professionally, but has also assisted in creating an enduring alliance between the community artists and Rhodes University through which drama in our community can grow.

ART OF THE STREET

The Art of the Street Project was initiated by Alex Sutherland in 2003, together with the Eluxolweni Street Shelter. Each year, the group worked towards a street theatre event which showcased at the National Arts Festival. In 2006, they were invited by the Contacting the World festival to Edinburgh. The project has shifted over the years as the original members have grown up and ‘graduated’ to other ventures and projects. Five of the original Art of the Street members perform in the Phezulu project, stilt walking around South Africa. Future plans involve re-inventing the Art of the Street and Youth Company into a new leg of Ubom! where young aspiring talents are workshopped throughout the year in preparation for following a career in the arts.
Float in 2009: “Float” was born out of the idea of creative and cultural exchange between different contexts. Barefeet Theatre in Lusaka and Ubom! Youth Company in Grahamstown were both selected to participate in the Contacting the World Festival in Manchester, UK. Barefeet participated in 2008, and Ubom! in 2006. This festival brings together youth theatre companies from all over the world in a parallel devising process, which we built on for this production. Both Ubom! and Barefeet are built on similar ideals of using theatre to transform young people’s lives – and in particular, young people who are often denied access to the arts. Both companies are made up of young people who have at one time in their lives, been forced to live or beg on the streets. Aylwyn Walsh, a facilitator for Contacting the World, saw the synergy in our approach to a bold, physical style of theatre making. So here we are, via the UK, to South Africa, for a unique collaboration between two of Southern Africa’s most dynamic theatre companies.

CHRISTMAS SHOW

The end of the year Christmas show is aimed at the greater community and is predominantly performed in alternative venues. The cast is expanded to include grass-roots community performers and community dancers. The Christmas Show aims to bring a little magic, wonder and fun into the lives of residents who live in Grahamstown, and who do not have the finances to leave Grahamstown for the festive season. The show is always a lively colourful uplifting celebration of the spirit of goodwill and compassion. he Christmas show is also performed at the army base, old age homes, the Prison, and hospitals all around Grahamstown.

ACHIEVEMENTS AND AWARDS

The company’s contribution to social development through the arts has earned it a number of accolades and awards. Recently this has included a Gold Award from the Impumelelo Innovations Trust (May 2008), in recognition of innovative approaches to public challenges and poverty alleviation. Buckland’s reception of the 2008 Shoprite Checkers/ SABC 2 Woman of the Year Award - South Africa’s premier accolade for achievement by women - also stands testimony to Ubom!’s phenomenal industry, impact and reach.
Makana Municipality: Acknowledgement of community service in recognition of the outstanding contribution and achievements made by Ubom! Eastern Cape Drama Company in the development and upliftment of people in the Makana Municipal area and beyond.