To make space for each other in this common world
By Phiwayinkosi (Kwanele) Nyembe
Drums are heard as we make our way to the entrance of the Elizabeth Sneddon Theatre. Rhythmic songs of celebration like those you hear when the troops return home from battle with victory. We are the troops. Those who have fought to keep contemporary dance alive despite so much loss in the wake of Covid-19.
After two years of online engagements, JOMBA! Contemporary Dance Experience returns home and the love felt in the Sneddon foyer is as plentiful as when we were plunged, suddenly, out of embodied community and into lockdown.
“Like you I love life” are the opening words of Dr. Lliane Loots, JOMBA! Curator’s welcome speech. The crowd is quiet like still waters, moved by the sincerity in her voice. And that instant connection brought by shared space and the physical recognition of one another. As the Zulu greeting goes. “Sawbona” meaning I see you. I acknowledge your presence in relation to mine.
On stage colourful displays of fan-shaped fabrics are hanging on the far side of each corner. The dancers: Marie-Caroline Hominal and Nelisiwe Xaba walk onto the stage. JOMBA!’s opening night presentation Hominal/Xaba begins. The dancers do not acknowledge each other nor do they acknowledge the audience. Monotonous analogue sounds play while the dancers stretch strings of wool across the stage floor. This goes on for a while, until you wonder “when will they start dancing?” but what you don’t realize is that they already have. And you have been part of it too… In your conversations with friends and family, over the past two years wondering when we will return back to ‘normal’, in the foyer before the show started… you have been participating in this dance and you see more of yourself reflected as the piece continues.
Initially, there is no overt communication between the dancers. Their movement feels natural as dance should. The freedom of dancing in the absence of being seen. They walk faster and faster… lights flicker on stage at irregular intervals. The two dancers begin to crawl underneath the woven wool on stage. Seeing them confined, under the woven wool, struggling, immediately sparked a thought: How do we move and live within a confined space? Which is exactly what Covid forced us to do. It isolated us.
The dancers slowly rise. Each rising at her own pace. Each using a small pair of scissors to snip her way through the woven wool, it begs the question: what informs the urgency or delay of one’s freedom in respect to another’s?
Once the dancers find their feet and free themselves they continue cutting through, and simultaneously wrapping themselves in the woven wool, creating their costumes before our eyes. They exit stage on opposite sides returning with a laptop and a Bluetooth speaker. We are treated to a collage of recent TikTok trends, interpreted by the dancers and delivered with a healthy dose of humour and simultaneous critique towards platforms that offer dance purely for entertainment purposes.
To do the latest TikTok trends, to compete in relation to who is the better dancer; none of that comes remotely close to work that needs to be done when the troops return from battle. Because they don’t all come back. Some are lost along the way. Some come home to find their loved ones no longer there. They find vacant homes, studios shut down, theatres closed. There is work to be done and the digital has offered a way of reaching the masses but let it be with the purpose to rebuild to reconstruct and reconnect.
Hominal/Xaba has its second and final performance at the Elizabeth Sneddon Theatre at 7pm tonight, as part of the JOMBA! Contemporary Dance Experience. Tickets may be booked through Computicket or purchased from one hour before the show at the theatre box office. JOMBA! runs until 11 September and a full programme may be found on their website: https://jomba.ukzn.ac.za
