A Cohort of Fierce Innovators
The 2021 Standard Bank Young Artists were announced on September 2, 2021, in a vibrant online awards event that set the tone for a year of creative activity. Founded in 1981, the Standard Bank Young Artist Awards have become a touchstone for South Africa’s most promising artists with many of the Awards’ alumni enjoying local and international success. The recognition that comes with the Awards carries weight with international arts institutions, funders and the public alike. Each artist will receive a cash incentive, as well as a commission to premiere a new work or exhibition at the 2022 National Arts Festival.
The 2021 Standard Bank Young Artists are:
Thando Doni
2021
Standard Bank Young Artist for Theatre
Although based in the Western Cape, 35-year
old Thando considers the Eastern Cape his cultural and aesthetic home. He has
worked extensively with Magnet Theatre but has also worked with the Actors
Voice Theatre Company, Masibambisane Youth Theatre Organisation, Emlanjeni
Theatre Productions, and the Manyanani Entertainers. Doni is a resident actor
at Bonfire Theatre Company.
Says National Arts Festival Artistic Committee member for theatre, Caroline Calburn:
“Thando is a remarkable theatre maker who,
without fail, creates magic regardless of who he is working with. He is one of
the rare theatre makers who works across the board – from young people through
to ex-offenders and professional performers. His ability to craft theatrical
experiences that are profound and profoundly moving is singular. One is changed
after watching a performance created by Thando. And often the lives of his
performers are changed for the better too. He is dogged, works in the harshest
of conditions, but his passion for the work and for the people he works with
puts him right up there along with the best.”
Cara Stacey
2021
Standard Bank Young Artist for Music
Gauteng-born Cara Stacey is trained in both
the piano and the southern African musical bow (umrhubhe, uhadi, and
makhweyane). In addition to being a composer and performer, she is a
musicologist and scholar who holds a Ph D and is a Senior Lecturer in African
Music at North-West University.
“Be it in recordings, arrangements, performances, or workshops, Cara’s work is rich and complex and at the same time beautifully accessible. She is a trailblazer for connecting different histories and forms of sound, and making them more than the sum of their parts,” remarks Artistic Committee member for music, James Webb.
Kristi-Leigh Gresse
2021
Standard Bank Young Artist for Dance
Kristi-Leigh is a graduate of The
University of KwaZulu-Natal (Howard College) and is from the province. She has
performed extensively locally and internationally with a number of local
choreographers and directors including Lliane Loots, Jay Pather, Sean Bovim,
Mandla Sunnyboy Motau Ntuli, Warona Seane, Lulu Mlangeni and Lyanda Sidiya and
others. In 2018, Kristi-Leigh won a Standard Bank Gold Ovation Award for her production
Sullied at the National Arts
Festival. As a result, Sullied has
also been staged at The Brighton Fringe festival as part of the Pebble Trust:
International Touring Bursary, and went on to win the South East Dance Award at
the festival in 2019.
“Working with a long list of influential arts practitioners has provided Kristi-Leigh with a base to explore her own identity as an artist. Kristi-Leigh’s work has mostly become centred around the politics of the body and identity. Her work is arresting and her work ethic is formidable,” says Artistic Committee member for dance, David April.
Buhlebezwe Siwani
2021
Standard Bank Young Artist for Visual Art
Raised in Johannesburg, Buhlebezwe has
always enjoyed a nomadic existence having also lived in Eastern Cape and
KwaZulu-Natal. She completed postgraduate degrees at the Wits School of Arts
and the Michaelis School of Fine Arts. Following residencies in France,
Switzerland and the Netherlands, her work has been exhibited from Europe to
Asia and Australasia to America. She has also published two books, Imfihlo (2015) and Qab’Imbola (2018). Buhlebezwe lives in Amsterdam and Cape Town.
Says Artistic Committee member for Visual Arts, Vulindlela Nyoni: “At 34, Buhlebezwe has paved a path for artists through her work with healing and spirit. Articulating work that is highly contemporary and relevant, Buhlebezwe has a versatility across mediums working across film, the body, and more typical gallery presentations, a versatility much-needed in these ever-shifting times.”
Gavin Krastin
2021
Standard Bank Young Artist for Performance Art
Gavin Krastin is a South African
performance artist, live artist, scenographer and arts educator. He is
Makhanda-based and his work spans the worlds of theatre, visual arts and
contemporary performance. Gavin's interests lie in the permeability and
politics of the body’s representation, limitation and operation in alternative,
layered spaces. His practice is inspired by his immediate South African
environment and one’s positionality and transgression in the history embedded
in its shifting socio-political landscape within a global-local framework.
Krastin is a regular performer and mentor of work at the National Arts Festival, NAF Artistic Director Rucera Seethal notes that he is “a mindful, risky and brave artist who works with extremity, is meticulous, and has really opened the door for a next generation of performance artists, revitalising the field.”
Vuma Levin
2021
Standard Bank Young Artist for Jazz
Levin is a guitarist whose compositions
combine South African musical traditions with jazz, pop and electronics. He has
lived and worked in Madrid, Amsterdam, Basel and Johannesburg. After teaching
at various conservatoriums in the Netherlands, he returned to South Africa to
take up a lecturing post at the University of the Witwatersrand. He has
produced four studio albums to date, and his latest – the concept album Antique Spoons, which was also
accompanied by the release of three short films – has been critically acclaimed
for its virtuosity.
“Vuma is a very accomplished musician who is comfortable in a wide array of musical styles and has impressive technical ability on the guitar. His explorations of music, culture and identity intersect in unique ways and his original compositions are both complex and listenable. He has carved a genuine path of musical integrity for himself in the competitive European jazz scene and is taking South African jazz in unusual new directions,” says Artistic Committee Member for Jazz, Alan Webster.
Works presented by the 2021 Standard Bank
Young Artists will be announced with the National Arts Festival programme in
2022.
Message from the festival organisers:
Take the #NAF2021 Survey
If you watched the 2021 National Arts
Festival, please let us know what you thought by taking our 5 minute survey.
Conducted on behalf of the NAF by Rhodes University, this ongoing research
forms a vital part of how we plan and reimagine our future Festivals.
If you leave your email when you complete the survey (it will register seperately to your survey answers) you'll also be entered into the draw to win a National Arts Festival goodie box.
https://docs.google.com/forms/d/e/1FAIpQLSdRkNkmBYaadUGBaUGB5RQ_4l6Nyv4HAjbOI2XxeNWGIvHB1Q/viewform
Please note the survey closes on Friday September
10, 2021.
Our mailing address is: info@nationalartsfestival.co.za
Posts
