Mpumalanga Performing Arts Laboratory

Shortly after 4pm Sibusiso Mthombothi has them running up and down the hall, running and sliding along the polished floors. Then he has them dancing and singing. Outside the hall some of the older children are gathered around Florence Sambo, learning about the ancient African musical instrument, the mbira.

Sibusiso comes each weekday to the community hall to teach the children about the performing arts. He works for the South African Police Service but gives his time, after work, five days a week.  For this he doesn’t earn a cent.

Sibusiso’s community work is one facet of a remarkable organisation called the Mpumalanga Performing Arts Project. Earlier that day, the other facet of the project was strutting its stuff in front of an audience of more than a hundred at a conference venue just outside Nelspruit. Eleven performers acted out a short play about HIV/Aids that started with comedy and culminated in a candlelight procession to remember those killed by the disease. The performance ended with the cast singing a poignant song written specially by one of the members:  “Give love, give hope and inspiration; Give encouragement to live with positivity.” The performance was part of a conference arranged by a government department to raise awareness of Aids and its prevention. It is by doing commissioned performances like this that the project pays its way.

Sifiso Hlatshwayo, a bushy-bearded 31 year old from Mpumalanga, is the brains behind the project. In his early twenties he created Wangesheya Wangesheya, a play about forced removals which he workshopped, wrote and produced. Thanks to the outreach programme of the Market Theatre in Johannesburg, the play was given a six-week run at the Laager Theatre and, as Sifiso recalls, “once you’ve performed professionally, everything changes”. After doing various courses at the Market Theatre Lab, Sifiso started working in industrial theatre, delivering performances on health and safety, HIV/Aids and corporate presentations to clients.

In 2002 while working as a community theatre field worker on another Market project, Sifiso returned to Mpumalanga. “At that time I realised my friends [in performing arts] were all locating to Johannesburg because they believed they couldn’t make a living doing what they were doing in Mpumalanga,” says Sifiso. “That was when I decided to start a group, doing industrial theatre, which would allow people to stay in the province, to work and boost performing arts in Mpumalanga. You don’t actually have to own a theatre group; you just need a group of reliable people you can work with. That’s how Mpumalanga Performing Arts Project got started.”

What began as essentially a training programme has since grown into a vibrant, multifaceted performing-arts project that gives performances of theatre, dance, poetry and storytelling at festivals and in theatres and which trains youngsters all over Mpumalanga (as Sibusiso Mthombothi is doing in Kanyamazane). Sifiso runs the project from offices he shares with the Mutariko Arts Project in Nelspruit. Margaret Phiri, one of a core of ten regular performers, assists Sifiso with the administration. (The project’s team includes two writers, three dancers and four actors although, as Sifiso explains, some of these wear several hats.)

Reaching out to tourists is a new direction in which Sifiso is now taking the project. Recently, he says, the project has performed for visitors to the province in the Lowveld Botanical Garden and at a camp in the Kruger National Park.

“We’re always keen to perform for tourists,” says Sifiso. “People really enjoy seeing our performances. It adds that extra dimension to their visit, giving them a feel for the culture of this province. Plus, it helps to support our outreach programmes.

“I try to do my job perfectly – although I’m not a perfectionist. But TEP are really helping us to do things perfectly; they’ve given us training, particularly on marketing ourselves and they’re helping with our website. The cluster programme, we think, is a beautiful thing. We get to meet the owners of accommodation places, tour operators, restaurant owners and crafters and we all work together. This cluster is really going to put us on the map.”