"The arts have a central role to play in nation building and in building social cohesion," says Marlene le Roux, director of Artscape audience development and education. "Therefore the Artscape High School Drama Festival is a catalyst for young people to express themselves creatively how they see South Africa and Africa and to engage with each other across cultural barriers, language and geographical areas, to start to build an understanding of the environment they live in. This project is to start to re-shape conceptions and attitudes that we have of each other as Africans."
Generously supported by the GrandWest Heritage Foundation, the festival was initiated and coordinated by Artscape's educational youth development programme that aims to promote social cohesion, good citizenship and empowerment through the arts.
The finalists will be transported to the Artscape Theatre in August, where they will take part in the High School Drama Main Festival aimed at broadening their skills. At the end of the competition, the winners will be announced at a gala awards ceremony on 18 August, where they will receive their prizes.
The benefits of participating in the competition are numerous and on-going. Schools become hubs of sustainable learning as they are given a platform to voice their own creativity, views and concerns to a captive audience while they also get an opportunity to broaden their horizons by experiencing the magic of live theatre, lights, sound and an audience.
This year's theme is Living Values, and will be adjudicated by Stian Bam, Francois Toerien, Sticks Mdidimba and Peter Butler who will be tasked to select the winners in the categories Best Actor, Best Actress, Best Supporting Actress, Best Script, Best Director, Best Production, Best Innovative Technical, and for the Option Adjudicator's Award.
