Africa\u2019s cultural icons on Monday took part in a webinar aimed at celebrating the continent\u2019s living human treasures.<\/p>\n
The webinar, organised by the Government Communication and Information System (GCIS) created a platform for arts and heritage practitioners in the African Union (AU) member States to exchange best practices in celebrating Africa\u2019s heritage systems, values and attitudes in the digital world.<\/p>\n
The CEO of the National Arts Festival and Grahams town Foundation, Monica Newton, said in February this year, they started planning for scenarios impacted by COVID-19.<\/p>\n
Newton said her festival team went from building venues to building a website that could host a festival.<\/p>\n
Newton said the arts sector imagined a new world, a new medium and a new audience engaged through the eye of a camera.<\/p>\n
\u201cIncome opportunities for artists and the technical production services sector were created. New audiences were reached locally and abroad.<\/p>\n
\u201cSignificant goodwill with the arts sector was created through both the process, publicity and income opportunities presented to artists. It generated significant publicity and grew the social media presence of the festival significantly,\u201d Newton said.<\/p>\n
The festival\u2019s long-term sponsors and partners have continued to lend their support.<\/p>\n
\u201cOur virtual gallery and virtual green spaces will continue to be hosted to build the online audience base and test the viability of online models for the festival.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe used to talk about a \u2018post-COVID\u2019 future but it is now clear that we will be living with the pandemic for some time,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n
Newton said to survive COVID-19, they are going to need the help and support of every art lover, artist, government and every possible business partner.<\/p>\n
Renowned jazz musician Jimmy Dludlu said the changes brought on by COVID-19 are extremely challenging, especially for musicians.<\/p>\n
\u201cThese days as artists, we have to come up with new innovative ways to adapt to the new normal.\u201d<\/p>\n
Opening up to new experiences<\/strong><\/p>\n It is Dludlu\u2019s extensive travels around the world that have made him open to being adaptable. One of the things he has learned from is diverse cultures, particularly other African languages.<\/p>\n \u201cThroughout the world, I was exposed to many people and that made more interested in other languages and other people\u2019s heritages,\u201d Dludlu said.<\/p>\n Dludlu said young people must be taught about the country\u2019s heritage and preserve it.<\/p>\n \u201cMy dream is to build a digital icon for our young people. We need to find a way to preserve all our continent\u2019s different cultures and heritages. In our continent, we have a rich culture,\u201d he said. <\/p>\n Director-General of the Department of Sport, Arts and Culture, Vusumusi Mkhize, said the month of September is a time when South Africans take pride in their rich and diverse cultural heritage and many languages, cultural practices, belief systems and diverse skills and knowledge systems.<\/p>\n \u201cThese are our elders who have preserved and excelled in the preservation of our indigenous knowledge that they inherited from elders within their communities.<\/p>\n \u201cOur indigenous knowledge has been systematically denigrated and at times destroyed by colonial and apartheid authorities across the continent,\u201d Mkhize said.<\/p>\n Africa has also produced distinguished women and men, who have contributed to the liberation of the continent.<\/p>\n \u201cWe owe a great deal to the dedication of these compatriots,\u201d Mkhize said.<\/p>\n He said there is a need to take lessons from knowledge holders, past and present.<\/p>\n \u201cOur liberation heroes and heroines fought to liberate our continent from colonial subjugation. Our Living Human Treasures are still preserving the indigenous knowledge of our continent.\u201d<\/p>\n GCIS Director-General Phumla Williams said the webinar was a platform for arts and heritage practitioners in the AU member States to exchange best practices in celebrating Africa\u2019s heritage systems.<\/p>\n \u201cThese important sessions continue to create a platform for exchanging ideas and information on best practices,\u201d she said. \u2013 SAnews.gov.za<\/strong> <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Africa\u2019s cultural icons on Monday took part in a webinar aimed at celebrating the continent\u2019s living human treasures. The webinar, organised by the Government Communication and Information System (GCIS) created a platform for arts and heritage practitioners in the African Union (AU) member States to exchange best practices in celebrating Africa\u2019s heritage systems, values and […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_genesis_hide_title":false,"_genesis_hide_breadcrumbs":false,"_genesis_hide_singular_image":false,"_genesis_hide_footer_widgets":false,"_genesis_custom_body_class":"","_genesis_custom_post_class":"","_genesis_layout":"","ngg_post_thumbnail":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[1],"tags":[38678],"class_list":{"0":"post-167012","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","6":"category-south-africa","7":"tag-sanews","8":"entry"},"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/167012","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=167012"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/167012\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=167012"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=167012"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=167012"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}