Staying close to the core of Roots and its excavation of autobiography and family history, we are pleased to offer an open workshop for festival audience and artists. The workshop will approach storytelling and narrative technique as a way of reflecting upon and transforming lived experience. Participants will be guided through a process of reflection, creation and, perhaps, sharing. You will be encouraged to dig into your life, your family or relationships, unearthing moments or memories that carry personal significance. We’ll look at the ways in which those stories can be the seed for artistic creation. And we’ll consider what the creative process brings to personal rebirth and growth. By considering the situatedness and socio-political context of our individual lives, we’ll encourage discussion about the larger reverberations of personal stories: of you, me, our families and communities.
Each workshop will be intimate and informal, and will include a warm up, introductory exercises, discussion, writing, sharing and diverse performative forms.
PRODUCTION CREDITS
The workshop is facilitated by Leila Anderson and Wanjiku Mwawuganga
Photos: Murathe Ngigi (@_pichad)
ABOUT THE ARTISTS
Leila Anderson is a theatre-maker, dramaturg & educator from Cape Town, currently based in Belgium. She has a BA Theatre-making from UCT (2006) and an MA from DasTheatre, Amsterdam (2016). She is co-founder of Borderlands Public Arts Project, a social arts initiative that created artistic encounters between segregated communities. She is a former curator of Infecting the City Festival (2016 & 2017). Working somewhere between dramaturg and director, she has co-created projects with many artists. Most recently with Wanjiku Mwawuganga on ROOTS, performed across Kenya and at Spielart Festival [DE] & Zurcher Theaterspektakel [CH] and Ogutu Muraya on Because I Always Feel Like Running (2016), The Ocean Will Always Try to Pull You In (2020) and How to Observe a Stone that is About to Strike You? for Festival Kultuurregion Stuttgart (2022). She enjoys facilitating and reflecting on the creative process, with students, artists and all ages, as has recently run workshops in Romania, Kenya and Belgium.
Wanjiku Mwawuganga is a Kenyan actor, writer, and director. She completed her studies of Film and Theatre Arts at Kenyatta University in Nairobi. As an actor, she appeared in several short films and theater productions, such as in ARE WE HERE from Ogutu Muraya. Her directorial debut followed in 2015 with WE WON’T FORGET, which was invited to the Kampala International Theatre Festival and the Jalada Literally Mobile Festival in Kenya and was shown in 2017 at the Ubumuntu International Festival in Rwanda. Her most recent work includes the dramaturgy and direction of TAKING MY FATHER HOME from the author Sitawa Namwalie. Wanjiku Mwawuganga is an alumna of the DAH Theatre International Summer School of the class of 2019 and a scholarship holder of the Zürcher Theater Spektakel 2020 Watch and Talk. Her one woman show ‘ROOTS’ was recently staged at the Cheche Gallery in Nariobi and at the Spielart Festival Müchen, 2021 and Zurcher Theatre Spektakel 2022. ROOTS is currently doing its East African Tour.
