adminBongani Ndlovu Showbiz Correspondent
INTWASA Arts Festival koBulawayo has decided to honour the National Art Merit Awards (Nama) 2014 winners and nominees from Bulawayo saying their achievements have united the city’s arts fraternity.
A Nama winners and nominees strictly formal and red carpet reception will be held at the National Gallery of Zimbabwe from 5PM on Saturday. This follows another party held for the winners at The Lounge last week.
Umbiko kaMadlenya (that was premiered at the festival last year) made a clean sweep in the Nama theatre awards as it won the Outstanding actor (Memory Kumbota), actress (Bathabile Dlamini), director (Nelson Mapako) and theatrical production. Bulawayo artistes took 12 awards out of 33 at the Namas that were held in Harare a fortnight ago.
Intwasa Festival director Raisedon Baya said they had initially wanted to pay tribute to the cast of Umbiko kaMadlenya and those who were involved in the book, but decided to invite and celebrate with all the winners.
“At first we wanted to hold a reception for the cast of Umbiko and those involved in the Folktales book, but we then decided to call everyone who won,” Baya said.
He said by hosting the reception, they wanted to show others that people needed to celebrate others’ achievements and not be preoccupied with complaining.
“When there’s something amiss in the arts we’ll point it out, but there’s a problem that has developed with artistes in the city. We tend to preoccupy ourselves more with complaining about a whole host of things and stop working for the arts.
“Then we’ve less to celebrate about at the end of the day,” Baya said.
He added that artistes had resources to turn around the fortunes of the arts industry in the city, if only they stopped comparing themselves with those in Harare and South Africa.
“With company closures in the city, the arts industry is the next best thing to make money by providing people with quality entertainment. We’ve the human resources to turn around the arts industry only if we work hard, rather than comparing ourselves to Harare and South Africa.”
Online Reporter