(Right: FLATFOOT dancers Sifiso Khumalo, Jabu
Siphika, Zinhle Nzama, Siseko Duba, Sbonga Ndlovu and Ndumiso Dube in
ENKUNDLENI. Pic by Val Adamson)
KZN’s premier
contemporary dance company presents a new season called ENKUNDLENI for two performances only at the Elizabeth
Sneddon Theatre on Friday, May 8 at 19h00 and Saturday, May 9 at 14h30.
Referencing open spaces where we gather, ENKUNDLENI offers audiences four new cutting-edge works created by company dancers, Sifiso Khumalo, Jabu Siphika, Siseko Duba, and Zinhle Nzama, with direction and dramaturgy by company artistic director Lliane Loots.
“It’s a programme of dance that reminds us of the power of our bodies to tell stories; stories of pain and triumph, of deep self-reflections and of community,” says Loots. “These works honour the storyteller in all of us, as we see the six incredible dancers of FLATFOOT tackle the most personal and most beautiful parts of being human at this time in our difficult geopolitics”.
The season begins with Siseko Duba’s quartet iPupho that dives into the powerful and mysterious terrain of dreams. The work captures the uncanny experience of awakening within a dream - where the body moves through worlds that feel intensely real, yet remain just beyond reach. Given the deep African connection to ancestral presence and dreams, this work navigates a very contemporary world of memory, self, and belonging.
Zinhle Nzama’s duet Brightest Darkness explores the deep paradox of finding light within darkness. It is an intimate duet between a man and a woman, where these two figures navigate tension, resistance, connection, and letting go, as an act of courage rather than defeat. Ultimately, Nzama’s work offers audiences a testament to survival and triumph – beautiful and painful!
Jabu Siphika’s solo work, next on the programme, Ngibize Siphi? explores the search for identity through the question of one’s surname. The solo reflects a deeply personal journey of belonging, loss, and self-discovery as Siphika navigates her own fragmented amaZulu histories and the need for recognition through how we are, or are not, named.
FLATFOOT veteran, Sifiso Khumalo ends the programme with his new work, “in transit”. Echoing a nation that sits, stands, and waits in long queues, this extraordinary male trio delves into how we stop, move on, wait to continue, and endlessly begin again and again. The work infers a deep-seated distress at the waiting on broken promises – be these local, personal, and further global politics.
FLATFOOT partners again with lighting designer Wesley Maherry whose evocative designs see these four works sculpturally find a home on the Sneddon stage. Maherry’s lighting intensifies the narratives of each work and pulls the audience into the visions and contemporary world of ENKUNDLENI.
FLATFOOT’s ENKUNDLENI has two performances only at the Elizabeth Sneddon Theatre, on Friday May 8 at 19h00 and Saturday May 9 at 14h30.
Tickets R100 each (students, scholars and pensioners pay R80). Booking is via Webtickets - https://www.webtickets.co.za/event.aspx?itemid=1592907018
This season is made possible through a partnership with the Elizabeth Sneddon Theatre (UKZN).
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