[Achievement Story] Series #3Dance Together with the community “Showing value”
Achievement Story share the project that CPI participants lead after receiving CPI training. We deliver their stories about what they improve the environment of the public cultural industry and how culture and arts could contribute to healing the community for a better life.
Give Voice, Deliver Messages
Nantea Dance Company is a Tanzanian based not-profit contemporary dance company composed of freelance dance artists, established in 2015. Girls Power Dance Group is a Tanzanian female dance group focusing Traditional dance and contemporary dance.
Nantea Dance Company and Girls Power Dance Group will collaborate to create a new dance performance that promotes the idea of men and women living together as equals and offers critiques about the present circumstances in the city of Dar es Salaam and Tanzania. Titled ‘ONYESHA THAMANI’, which means ‘SHOWING VALUE”, the performance gives voice and offer new perspectives towards gender equality by showing the importance of women through the artform of dance. The dance performance will be created specifically to be performed in outdoor and non-conventional spaces and locations that have never been platforms for live dance performances before, allowing it to reach new audiences and increase its impact in the community.
We want to use dance to bring people together to witness dance performance and also to discuss about the challenges and abuses women are facing within our society. We want to inspire the audience and the people who will witness the performance to have new perspectives and also to become ambassadors of social change within their communities. We want to support women with artistic talent to convey their messages of resilience and independence, and the empowerment that women are in charge of their lives and have the ability to independently make choices in all aspects of their life. We aim to promote equal rights in our society and to counteract sexual and emotional abuse of women.
Collaboration
The choreography will be informed by testimonials given by women about the challenges and abuses they have faced in society. These testimonials will be offered in confidential discussions led by the female dancers of Girl Powers Dance Group. The testimonials will be anonymous but the women sharing them will understand that their stories and views may be used as inspiration for the dance piece. We will take the dance performance to rural and public spaces where they don’t usually have live dance performances. We will engage with the community through a live dance performance and discussion around the topic about the challenges and abuses women are facing within our society.
We have managed to develop the project concept. So we have started to exchange and engage more with the two companies Nantea Dance Company and Girls Power Dance Group on depths on how we can make the project and the message we want to deliver to the community clearer. We have also managed to receive a grant as part of the “feel free” cultural grant funding by Nafasi Art Space with The Embassy of Switzerland in Tanzania to make the project to life.
Inspire and impact
Through participating in the SIDance’s Dance Exchange hosted by the Seoul Section of the International Dance Council CID-UNESCO as part of the CPI Program 2019, I was able to collaborate with artists from different parts of the world and with different experiences and backgrounds. It has impacted me to have a better and a clear understanding in organizing collaboration base projects with other artists either in Tanzania or outside of Tanzania, understanding ways on how to communicate within the process of the collaboration and solving issues or problems that may rise during the process.
We believe that Onyesha Thamani will help to bring awareness within our society with new perspectives about the challenges and abuses women have faced within our society. We want to show our local community on how dance can be used to in creating awareness and addressing social and community-based issues.
What's next?
With this project we are leading, we are planning to reach more people here in Tanzania not only here in Dar es Salaam but also other regions. So, we are working at the moment and seek other organizations or individuals that can come on board to either support or being part of this project.
Samwel Japhet (Tanzania)
He is a dance artist and artistic director of Nantea Dance Company and co-curator of Contemporary Dance Night Event. He received training at the Seoul Section of the Int’l Dance Council(2019)
