Just what the doctor ordered

Public catches the bug as sixth annual Cape Town arts event almost doubles in size

CAPE Town was transformed into a hub of creativity this week as the city’s public spaces became stages for visual arts, music and dance, all combining to create the spectacular sixth annual Infecting the City Festival.

The festival almost doubled in size this year, with 54 performances and installations compared with last year’s 30-something.

“Infecting the City brings together artists from across the world, telling stories using dance, music and photography. Some of the works are based on audience participation, which really allows city residents to get involved, and even influence, the final product,” said Grant Pascoe, the city’s mayco member for tourism, events and marketing.

The festival started on Monday and ends today. Highlights of the festival so far have included The Commuter, where train passengers at Cape Town station were asked more about themselves to create a portrait and map of stories, a visual symphony of lights as the City Lights Orchestra lit up Church Square, and a performance by the Cape Philharmonic Orchestra, also in Church Square.

If you hurry you can still see some of the installations on offer before the festival ends this afternoon. The Jazzart Dance Theatre Company will be performing Moving News at 11.30 this morning in St George’s Mall, exploring ways in which the media packages news for different classes of people in the city.

At 12.45 you can head to Government Avenue for In/Apt: A Contemporary Public Hanging by Shaun Acker, an aerial dance performance exploring socio-political and his- toric values. You can also “celebrate words and everyone’s innate ability to play” with 100 giant Scrabble tiles available in Government Avenue, before heading to St George’s Cathedral at 2pm for Timbila Tracks, a combination of music and images by Matchume Zango and Walter Verdin.

“This year’s festival comes ahead of Cape Town hosting the World Design Capital next year, when the global focus will be on the city’s creative community,” Pascoe said.

The World Design Capital is a year-long festival of creativity and design, awarded bi-annually by the International Council for Societies of Industrial Design.

According to Pascoe, Cape Town is studying submissions for a World Design Capital-linked performing arts festival planned for July next year.

Find out for more about the Infecting the City programme at www.infectingthecity.com/2013.

PICTURE: WILLEM LAW THE WIDOW: Aphiwe Livi performs in The Widow by Mandisi Shindo depicting the ‘love, marriage and life’ of five women, using the architecture of St George’s Cathedral as inspiration.

PICTURE: NEIL BAYNES B EHIND CLOSED DOORS: Festival goers were treated to a glimpse of the lives of those who are discriminated against through the corrugated iron walls of their ‘houses’ in Thibault Square’.

PICTURE: NEIL BAYNES EXPRESSION: Okuya Phantsi Kwempumlo or The Meal, a performance celebrating love and courage performed by Nyamza, Dinah Eppel and Kirsty Ndawo, took place in the Iziko National Museum’s whale well.

PICTURE: NEIL BAYNES LET’S DANCE: One of French artist Antoine Tempe’s 36 portraits depicting dance. The portraits were located in The Company’s Gardens and on the Cape Town Station forecourt.

PICTURE: NEIL BAYNES FROM CAPE TO CAMP: Cecil John Rhodes was cloaked in fabric to ‘destabilise the notion of the monument’.

PICTURE: NEIL BAYNES REAL LIFE: The Fourth Person in the Yard gave audiences an idea of what one fails to see when observing a ‘normal’ situation.

PICTURE DAVID RITCHIE STARTLING: In MnemosynE Angelique Kendall explores ‘the intersection of self and other, self and all else’.

PICTURE: NEIL BAYNES EROSION: In this performance by Marcus Neustetter 20 000 glow-sticks are used to create a drawing.