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Background
ACTION CENTRE, workshop for the performing
arts, was the initial workshop programme
developed in 1974/5 as a precursor
to the Africa Cultural Centre. The
project at that stage grew as a result
of the discourse on Third World Cultures
at the Shiraz Festival of Third World
Theatre (Iran).
In 1978 the project was briefly known
as Soyinka Theatre Workshop after
Wole Soyinka, the Nigerian playwright
and Nobel Literature Laureat, when
it was presented for adoption to the
Federated Union of Black Artists (FUBA).
As the name suggests, ACTION CENTRE
was a programme in ciritcal consciousness
of the direct action of liberation.
The theatre offered a dynamic space
for encounter with conflic, and for
the intimacy of relationship between
the audience and performer, wherein
a radical and subversive new dialogue
was possible in spite of the condition
of oppression. Hence itactively mobilized
youth to the cause of radical liberatory
theatre and provided creative and
revolutionary training for it.
This phase of developmenttook a distict
turn with the 1976 Soweto Youth Uprising
when the project mutated into a decentralised
mobile unit concentrating it's work
in Soweto, Lenasia, Eldorado Park/
Kliptown and many other locations
throughout Southern Africa. It also
developed special workshops with teachers,
doctors and nurses (Baragwanath and
Coronation Hospitals). In the 80's
this unit became the project Adopt-a-Group.
Its task was to work with cultural
and social formations in township
settings on a daily basis. The impact
was radical and popular.
By 1982, two years after the foundation
of the Africa Cultural Centre, the
project grew into the CENTRE FOR RESEARCH
AND TRAINING IN AFRICAN THEATRE, reflecting
a maturity of purpose and function.
Accordingly, the focus shifted towards
development for liberation and development
as a consequence of liberation, the
objectives of which were embedded
in the culture and identity debate,
in a Pan-African ethos, and in a exploration
of African mythology and folklore
as the creative source point for African
Culture, art and creativity. This
exploration exploded the myth that
the performing arts where bequeathed
to Africa by colonialism. It was important
in the anti-colonial strugle to expose
the lie that paganised the
culture and artistic expressions of
Africa. The fundamental colonial strategies
of dislocation, depersonalisation,
alianation and cultural domination,
amongst others, became the core of
our cultural study and en evolving
methodology in the development of
the actor/activist and us, as opressed
persons.
The project was inspired by the psycho/social
studies of Franz Fanon and the life,
times and work of Herbert Isaac Dhlomo,
South African playwright, poet, essayist,
journalist and visionary amongst others.
The project has evolved into the Centre
for African Arts and now included
all the follwoing projects:
• Centre for Reasearch and Training
in African Theatre
• Contemporary African Dance
• African Music Conservatoire
• Visual Arts, Crafts and Design
• Media Communications Unit
• Carnival Afrika, School of
Carnival
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