The Virtual National Arts Festival has ended with an event to celebrate the winners of the 2020 Standard Bank Ovation Awards and recognise the artists who stepped onto the brand new vFringe online stage.
The vNAF2020, which took place from 25 June to 31 July, showed the resilience and innovation of the arts community, who set aside the everyday difficulties of surviving the Coronavirus pandemic and created work that inspired, informed and entertained audiences across the globe.
Live streamed to Facebook, the Standard 2020 Ovation Awards ceremony was attended by fans and followers of the arts as the 45 winners of the Standard Bank Ovation award were honoured and overall winners of the Bronze, Silver and Gold were announced. In celebration of the winners, 2020 Standard Bank Young Artist for Jazz, Sisonke Xonti, and 2013 Standard Bank Young Artist for Jazz, Shane Cooper performed during the show.
Opening the event, Standard Bank’s Head of Sponsorship, Desiree Pooe, said: “In the ten years we have hosted the Standard Bank Ovation Awards, it has been a programme that allows us, and the Festival, to recognise and celebrate the talent that is displayed and shared with us on the Fringe. The Fringe is that part of the programme that is not curated but, in my opinion, is really shaped by artists and is a very special place where the artists are really able to show us what they are capable of.”
National Arts Festival’s Artistic Director, Rucera Seethal, said the Standard Bank Ovation awards are a staple part of the National Arts Festival, “Initiated in 2010, the awards speak specifically to the uncurated, fringe component of the festival. Artistic innovation, excellence, the exploration of new performance styles and the courage to open new conversation through the arts underpin the motivation for the winners of the Standard Bank Ovation Awards.”
A panel of adjudicators spent countless hours reviewing work to find those productions that fully embraced performance for digital audiences and told stories that resonated with our current times and hopes for the future. They awarded 45 productions with the Standard Bank Ovation recognition, a badge that is placed on the show page as marker to audiences, but ten shows in particular stood out and were awarded Gold, Silver and Bronze awards as follows
BRONZE STANDARD BANK OVATION WINNERS
Once Upon A Circus
Presented by: Zip Zap Circus
Inyange Speaks
Presented by: Simbone Inyange
Mnquma
Presented by: Xolisile Bongwana
What Falling Feels Like.
Nicola Pilkington, Joe Young and Jade Delmage
SILVER OVATION
“Jazz in the theatre” featuring: Chadleigh Gowar
Presented by: 44 on Long (Pty) Ltd.
Next!
Presented by: Wela Kapela Productions
Beast In Him
Masifunde’s Academy of Creativity
Ouma Lilly & haar Klong
Presented by: Vulture Productions
GOLD OVATION
Women Hold Up The Sky
Presented by: WoMin African Alliance
The King of Broken Things
Presented by: Theatresmiths
Cash prizes are part of the Standard Bank Ovations Award package with the Standard Bank Bronze Ovation Awards recipients winning R 3000 each, Standard Bank Ovation Silver Awards recipients receive R 6000 each, and productions winning Gold Awards take home R10 000 each.
National Arts Festival’s Fringe Manager, Zikhona Monaheng, closed the event by reminding both artists and audiences that the National Arts Festival would continue to host the vFringe as a legacy of the vNAF2020, creating an ongoing digital home for the arts. She said that artists from all disciplines would be able to use the space without paying registration fees and would take home 90% of their ticket sales. The importance of artists marketing their own work was stressed as a critical way to encourage audiences to browse and view shows. The platform will remain in place as long as the Festival can facilitate it and for as long as there is a need for an online space for artists to present work to audiences online.
Artists wishing to submit work can visit https://nationalartsfestival.co.za/participate-in-vfringe-2020/
Audiences wanting to go and watch shows on demand, could visit https://nationalartsfestival.co.za
The adjudicators for the 2020 Standard Bank Ovation Awards were:
- Ogutu Muraya is a writer and theater maker whose work is embedded in the practice of He has been published in various anthologies and his performative works have been featured in several theatres and festivals within East Africa and internationally. He is based in Nairobi, where he continues his artistic practice and also teaches part time.
- Chuma Sopotela is a multi-award-winning actor, director, choreographer and performance artist, as well as recipient of the 2018 Standard Bank Young Artist award for Performance Art. Most recently she directed Dikgaruru presented at the 2019 Spielart Festival Munich, and created and performed A short tribute to Zwelidumile Geelboi Mgxaji Mhlaba “Dumile” Feni at the vNAF2020. From Eastern Cape originally she is now based in Cape Town.
- Mandla Mlangeni is a Johannesburg-based trumpeter, composer and bandleader. A member of the SAMA-nominated group Amandla Freedom Ensemble, he has toured extensively as a member of the Cape Town Opera. He was the 2019 Standard Bank Young Artist for Jazz.
The full list of Standard Bank Ovation winners for 2020:
Amagents
AMAGENTS IN PARTNERSHIP WITH THE GAUTENG DEPARTMENT OF SPORT, ARTS, CULTURE AND RECREATION
A Star is Born The rise and fall of Judy Garland
WELA KAPELA PRODUCTIONS
Beast in Him
MASIFUNDE’S ACADEMY OF CREATIVITY
Bonjour Monsieur Brel
JANNIE DU TOIT
Butlers and Billionaires: Till death do us part
SLICK ‘N SLEEVE
Certain Songs for Uncertain Times
ARIEL & JUANA
Corps/Body
ITROTRA ART X CONNECTION
Diamonds & Strings
ANDREW YOUNG
Domination
IS’THATHA DANCE PROJECT
EOAH a Noah and Edgar
EOAH_ZA
For Rhino in Tandem with Roddy Fox and Harry Owen
RODDY FOX AND HARRY OWEN
Fragmented Scribbles
SMANGALISO NGWENYA
From Makhanda to Kofifi
MAJOR DUO
Garry’s Retreat
VR THEATRICAL
girl.
NAMISA MDLALOSE
Hatchetman: (R)Evolution
HATCHETMAN
I Grandi Tenori in Concert
I GRANDI TENORI
I Am Because You Are
A COLLABORATION WITH VISUAL ARTIST SONYA RADEMEYER AND BAROQUE SINGER CHLOE LAM (HONG KONG)
Inyange Speaks
SIMBONE INYANGE
Jakob
THEATRESMITHS
“Jazz in the Theatre” featuring: Chadleigh Gowar
44 ON LONG (PTY)
“Jazz in the Theatre” featuring: Muneeb Hermans
44 ON LONG (PTY) LTD
Jon Shaban Live
JON SHABAN
Journey Beyond
ZIP ZAP CIRCUS IN COLLABORATION WITH THE CAPE TOWN PHILHARMONIC ORCHESTRA
Magic of Lata Mangeshkar Part One
SHASHIKA MOORUTH
Mnquma
XOLISILE BONGWANA
Next!
WELA KAPELA PRODUCTIONS
Nowhere People
KINSMEN
Once Upon A Circus
ZIP ZAP CIRCUS
Ouma Lilly & Haar Klong
VULTURE PRODUCTIONS
Quantitative Teasing
MVG PRODUCTIONS
Resillience
LLEWELLYN MNGUNI PRODUCTIONS
Sade in Hollandse Kombuise
SIPHUMEZE KHUNDAYI AND CHRISTINE VAN HEES
Sanan
GHASEDAK ART GROUP
Sondela
THESIS ZA
The Art of experimental acapella – Then, Now and Always
SIGNATURE SOUND A CAPELLA
The Ballad Of Lucy & Alexander
LIPSMAC PRODUCTIONS
The Hymns Of A Sparrow
MAGENTAPRO
The Joy of Classical Music
KWAZULU-NATAL PHILHARMONIC ORCHESTRA
The King of Broken Things
THEATRESMITHS
The Tower & The Tree
MIXED MEDIA
Veranda Panda – Panda Perspectives
VERANDA PANDA
What Falling Feels Like.
NICOLA PILKINGTON, JOE YOUNG AND JADE DELMAGE
Women Hold Up The Sky
WOMIN AFRICAN ALLIANCE
Zoom Room
VR THEATRICAL
ENDS
