Adapting & Re-Imagining
PROJECTS 2020 & BEYOND
It brings great sadness to announce that due to the COVID-19 World Pandemic, all physical face to face projects that CAFTA Co intended to carry out for 2020 has now come to a standstill.
The above decision had been made in accordance to the numerous speeches our South African president, Cyril Ramaphosa had given. We at CAFTA Co support his stance on the matter to fight the virus and thus have followed the strict rules and regulations that have been set in place.
In light of the Covid-19 worldwide pandemic, we at Create Awareness For The Arts have decided to carry out various digital projects on all our social media platforms in order to stay active, provide hope and spread awareness around everything art related. Here are a list of a few of the projects we have decided to run (until face-to-face contact with big groups are deemed acceptable):
CAFTA CO AMBASSADORS
The creators behind both live and digital artistic works
JAY-JAY JACOBS
Visual Artist & Photographer
I am enthusiastic about my work as a photographer because I enjoy what I do, and I have a consistent source of motivation that pushes me to do my best. My passion for photography drove me to push myself every day and learn new skills that helped me do better work. I am driven and ambitious. I thrive on a challenge and set goals for myself on a regular basis so that I have something to strive for. I'm not satisfied with mediocrity, and I'm always looking for ways to improve and achieve greatness.
TAAHIER EBRAHIM ( CODY COLLINS )
Dance Educator, Performer, Poet and Videographer
By day a professional dancer , Dance educator and videographer. By night a poet. I find beauty and humility in the outdoors . I’ll Netflix and chill any day . My focus is on God, family and self care .
WIAAM JACOBS
Dance Educator, Facilitator, Performer, Choreographer & Videographer
I currently identify as a developing multi-disciplinary creative artist focusing on dance pedagogy, choreography, mixed media, and visual art – namely: painting, drawing, photography, video, design, and filmmaking.
Whether I am teaching in a school setting or choreographing for a social media film, I use movement as a means to create a sense of community and connection. I am deeply interested in using dance as a form of self-expression, communication, transformation, and healing by illustrating emotional perspectives that emphasize the shared/common nature of social, economic, and/or political issues that we face as a South African society and as individuals. This stems from my personal belief – not only as a developing artist but as a coloured female facilitator/teacher – that the notion of representation and accessibility within all spaces/settings is something that should be fought for.
When considering the artistic work I engage in (irrespective of the medium), I believe that storytelling is important, thus I aim to create a series of meaningful images/motifs.
When it comes to my practice, each movement has meaning – using this approach allows me to move with quality and communicate ideas clearly. I believe the transformative and healing potential in dance lies in examining our ability to have intense emotional responses to our problems and struggles. In short – our physical bodies hold stories and emotions (sometimes trauma, joys & success too) that calls for an outlet. I believe we can enter an empowering place by identifying these emotional experiences through ritual and movement. When I choreograph, I like to focus on creating an intimate connection between the body and movement – to achieve this, I draw from everyday gestures, as well as a variety of dance (modern, contemporary, ballet, and African). I also draw on how one relates to the movement and strives to explore one’s individual relationship to movement.
The use of film in my creative practice is important too, as I am often inspired by images, scenes, or visual scenarios. By using angles, filters, focus, and creating a cinematic world, I feel I can contextualize movements in a new way. This allows me to highlight the nuances of simple movements. When it comes to film, I feel as though I can utilize different forms of media to create a multi-dimensional experience.
Moreover, my visual art practice is grounded in my dance background. While I am not formally trained in visual art, my knowledge, passion, and training in dance caused me to explore the use of ‘sensing’ in space - by which I mean finding ways to engage the audience senses, beyond what they see.
Overall, my artist vision includes: connection, storytelling, sensing, healing, transformation, self-expression, community, exploration, and ritual. These are the core values of my creative journey that I hope to bring to my artistic work.
YOLANDA MKHONTWANA
Content Creator
I am Yolanda Mkhontwana, a content creator who has the skills and intuition for timing and reading the room. I like to follow trends and integrate them into my work while staying true to my craft. I am a team player, I blend well with diverse individuals and I can follow briefs.
HANNAH TAYLA SAMPSON
Artist
An artist and an aspiring performance practitioner.
NIC MISO
Singer & Songwriter
Nic Miso is an singer, songwriter and a current Stellenbosch university student. He is one of the recipients of the Jazz yard academy founded by Chris Peterson and Gino Oliver. NIC MISO is a versatile artist whose musical influences range from genre's of opera, jazz, gospel,afro pop and hip hop. His main goal through music is to empower and to spread the love amongst humanity
CLEO CARELSE
Actress
Cleo Carelse is a Cape Town based actress, vocalist and professional trained crew member who obtained a BA degree in Acting for Camera at City Varsity. A Writer and director of numerous student productions and solo shows’ in which she has performed in. She had the opportunity to work on both local and international productions to date. She always wanted to be an artist in many forms. Becoming a M-Net Magic in Motion Alumni in 2018, this program was a space where she could increase her knowledge and skills as an actor as well as becoming an industry leader by supporting and assisting various departments to create a ease workflow from production to set. She specialized in the following areas; art department, wardrobe, production and production coordinating, events assistant as well as content producing. The outcome has enabled her to be more motivated, striving for opportunities that will allow her to carry out her passion for the arts.
TYRA ABRAHAMS
Dance Performer & Choreographer
I am a 21 year old dancer studying at UCT. In my free time i enjoy to paint, read and spend quality time with my family.
ORATILE NDIMANDE
Theatre Maker & Actor
Oratile Ndimande, a young man from Rusty-Dusty in the North West, is currently studying for a Bachelor of Arts in Theatre and Performance in the University of Cape Town. He loves writing half-finished poems, short stories and plays when he’s not thinking about how and when he’ll finish them. One play he did finish, a submission for UCT’s Res4Res Theatre Festival in 2019, won award for Best Script with an original submission, “So, No Dessert Then?”, for Rochester House. He developed the story with friend and classmate, Stian Oosthuizen.
This Christmas baby’s interest for the arts started in school, from school choirs, to high school productions, to him co-starring with classmate and friend Murray Hines in Stephan Kotze’s “Born Naked” in 2016 and being awarded first runner-up in the FEDA festival that same year. Thereafter they performed in the National Arts Festival in 2016.
One of his favourite quotes (from The Golden Girls) is from a humiliated, disappointed Dorothy S’boronack, “I look like the mother of a solid gold dancer”, she says as Father Frank Leahy, a failed chance at a romantic relationship due to his priesthood, compliments her sequence top. But that isn’t very inspirational, so another quote that has made an impression in his life, from an unknown source, “If you were able to believe in Santa for 8 years, you can believe in yourself for seconds. You’ve got this.”
MICALEB LAWRENCE
Theatre Maker & Actress
Currently a Drama and Theatre Studies student who has found her love for the arts through not only acting but also writing. As a performing arts student I find that story telling is an art form that is practiced by everyone. Not only professionals. Thus, I go the extra mile to write about what I see, think and feel. I want the untold stories that can change lives heard, read and performed.
I write poetry, serve on my university’s Private Student Organisation Senior Committee. Awarded as the Top Matric Student for my school in 2018 at PW Botha College. I have also had the honour of taking on lead roles in plays such as Annie The Musical and District 6 at my high school. I’ve also been lucky enough to have been one of the subjects/models for a student art exhibition which focuses on self-acceptance and the growth which comes from that.
I identity as a woman of colour who is also a natural hair enthusiast and modern-day feminist who believes in equality for all.
My aim in life has and always will be to include others. Those labelled “The outcasts” the ones society often forgets about. Growing up as someone who had to shout from the back of the room to be heard because she was not seen I hope to give a voice to the voiceless. I want to teach, mentor and equip young girls to believe in themselves again by giving them a platform to express their emotions and ideas through performing and writing. I hope to show young boys that they are the hope for this country. I want them to know that they will always have a reason to shine when it comes to the arts.
And finally, I want people to see how beautiful and precious story telling is. I want parents in our less privileged
ROBYN LEWIN
Dance Performer & Choreographer
I'm Robyn my friends call me Robss, some call me Rob. I'm a young woman passionate about the arts especially dance and choreography. Dance is a place where I feel safe and would hope that others could too find that safety. I'm not always the most confident or secure with in my art, never the less I work hard at it and am utterly In love with it and encourage all to keep going. I'm ever changing and always wanting to learn new forms and genres of the arts.
Wishing everyone peace and love.
FRANKA KIRBY
Theatre Maker
Franka is a third year theatre-maker who has a passion for storytelling. In a world filled with turmoil, Franka wants to tell stories that give different perspectives on the human experience and believes in creating spaces for one to be free, to love and heal.
A developing creative maven who’s interests focus but are not limited to acting, writing, directing, textile print making, sewing (clothes/costume), modelling, photography and movement.
As a coloured female who is working her way into a tough industry, I am motivated and draw inspiration from practitioners like Amy Jephta. Describing myself as a storyteller, I want my work to help and heal. In writing and acting, I want to create space for myself and others that resonate through authentic storytelling.
My work is for me to have fun, to heal someone somewhere, to encourage everyone in some way, and to normalise humanity, love and community above all the never-ending turmoil.
KF KULTURE: THE PODCAST
A platform to interview and converse with other local artists, personalities, talents and entrepreneurs in their respective mediums.