A taste of culture, whatever that is

I’ve just been to see a HIFA show at the 7 Arts theatre. Not bad at all, though not my usual cup of tea/jug of beer.

“Hope”, by a collaboration calling themselves Zvishamiso Arts, is really a mish-mash of ‘interpretive dance’, music, visual arts and poetry. Of course, I was sceptical (I mean what the feck is interpretive dance, anyway) but I went along with KR on the spur of the moment. And you know what? It didn’t suck.

Okay, the beginning sucked, cos I had no idea what the hell was going on, but it really picked up, with the backing music and storytelling helping to give the dancing a little…meaning? And there was Chiwoniso Maraire with her little mbira, doing her thang. And some other dude doing his poetry thing, while another dude was projecting (surprisingly relevant) images on to the backdrop, and all the lighting tricks, you know.

It made sense, and I left there thinking, hmmm, not bad, although there were a few weird moments with the sound doing dodgy things and microphones misbehaving. AT and I are seeing Gazza, the Namibian ‘kwaito’ artist or whatever, tonight, and he better live up to expectations or I’m bottling the stage, promise.

I still don’t know what the feck ‘interpretive’ dance is all about.