adminarts. This status was attained last month when the interim executive committee of ITI (Zimbabwe Centre) appointed last year paid the required national centre membership fee.
Since 1983 when Zimbabwe was admitted as an associate centre of ITI, it has been difficult to put together an executive committee of professional theatre artists that could harmonise resources from professional theatre practitioners to pay membership fees for national centre membership.
In the 1980s, it was mainly the difficulty of securing foreign currency that forced Zimbabwe to remain an associate centre of ITI.
In the 1990s, when the possibility of securing Unesco coupons using the Zimbabwe dollars presented itself, it was the difficulty of bringing together theatre practitioners who appreciated the benefits of belonging to an international theatre organisation. There were those theatre practitioners who, at that time, felt that organisations such as the International Theatre Institute could only benefit those who made their livelihood on full time theatre.
Since 2009, the Zimbabwean theatre sector has grown by leaps and bounds after going the depressed period of 1996-2000.
That period saw the collapse of the community theatre movement and its travelling theatre followed by the period of political uncertainty from 2000-2008 where commissioned theatre remained viable while exposing the concerned theatre practitioners to limitations imposed the agendas of those who sponsored commissioned theatre work.
Full membership to the International Theatre Institute is therefore not just a bold move with the great potential to enhancing the capacity of Zimbabwe’s fast growing theatre industry through opportunities for participation in the international theatre scene.
It is also a gigantic step of getting on board the world wide theatre network of ITI that will bring tremendous benefits to individual theatre practitioners, theatre companies, theatre institutions and organisations in Zimbabwe.
Membership to the ITI is through national centres.
Last year, theatre practitioners meeting in Harare appointed 10-member interim executive committee. These are Lloyd Nyikadzino, Zane Lucas, Eunice Tava, Elizabeth Muchemwa, Stephen Chifunyise, James Makwiringwindo, Daniel Maposa, Joanna Powell and Jasen Mphepo.
Theatre practitioners who attended the celebration to mark the World Theatre Day in March were encouraged to approach members of the interim executive committee concerning membership registration.
It was also indicated that since membership was through the national centre theatre practitioners only needed to pay US$10,00 as an annual membership fee, which could paid in monthly installments.
As indicated in discussion during the World Theatre Day celebrations, it is not that theatre practitioners can fail to raise the required annual membership fees.
There is a culture among Zimbabwean artists that is characterised by unwillingness to pay membership fees to their organisations – a tendency that has denied most national arts associations resources required for stable administration.
Of the 20 national centres of ITI in Africa, the Democratic Republic of Congo, Angola and Zimbabwe are the only fully-fledged national centres in the Sadc.
Through Zimbabwe’s active links with theatre companies and organisations in the Sadc, efforts to establish national centres of ITI in Swaziland, Botswana, Zambia and Malawi are gaining ground. If realised this move could lead to the establishment of a Sadc forum of ITI, which would promote collaborations in theatre productions intended for the international scene as well as possibilities for collective bidding to host international theatre festivals and congresses of the organisation.
Full-fledged membership to ITI offers the Zimbabwean centre an opportunity to send representatives to the 33rd ITI World Congress schedule for Xiamen, China from September 19-24. Three hundred international delegates and 100 Chinese delegates will attend the congress. One major highlight of the congress is a symposium on empowering the performing arts. The symposium which is scheduled for 23 September is intended to answer the question: “How can the performing arts contribute to a culturally diverse future?”
Most of the afternoons from September 20 to 24 are devoted to workshops on theatre for young audiences; theatre for development; Beijing Opera; Chinese local opera; monodrama and methods of fund raising for theatre development.
The host country will utilise this meeting of theatre professionals from all over the world to showcase its own theatre productions and theatre practice.
During the evenings, theatre companies from different parts of the world will present collaborative theatre performances.
There will also be presentations on the Freedom to Create Project as well as reports by the Cultural identity and Development Committee and the Theatre Without Borders.
It is at the World Congress that a new ITI Executive Committee is elected, and future work plans of the organisations are presented and adopted.
The various committees of the organisations also meet during the World Congress and contacts are established with international theatre organisations that collaborate with ITI.
These organisations include the International Federation of Actors; the International Amateur Theatre Association; International Association of Theatre for Children and Young People; the International University Theatre Association; the International Association of Theatre Critics; the International Association of Theatre Research and the International Puppeteers Union.
One of the most recent organs of the International Theatre Institute is the ITI World Performing Arts Academy that has established a “platform for exchange of knowledge and training in the performing arts in all corners of the world in order to enhance performance quality and artist status”.
The ITI attracts funds that ensure that renowned performing arts trainers in different parts of the world are provided with funds to cover transport costs and fees to enable them to transfer their knowledge and skills through workshops dealing with such aspects as playwriting, directing, acting, singing, lighting and stenography. The academy was inaugurated in December 2010 in Torino, Italy. The ITI has encouraged national centres to comment on its idea of University of the Theatre of Culture.
This idea, based on the goals of the Unesco Convention on the Protection and Promotion of the Diversity of Cultural Expressions, is “rooted on the view that the world possesses such a wealth of local cultures that need to be protected, promoted and put into dialogue with one another. This is done in order to benefit from each others wisdom”.
Consisting of a permanent structure with space for studios, performing arts stages, classrooms, multimedia centres and a library, the University of Cultures will offer training in theatre techniques, study in theatre history and undertaking of research.
The university will offer postgraduate students from different countries opportunities to work with master in theatre drawn from different parts of the world.
Online Reporter