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The art of those who dare | Nora Chipaumire

April 16th, 2020

It would be dishonest of me to say I don’t often wonder why theatre exists… Which is to say I often wonder why I exist… Don’t get me wrong, this is not about that examined life, reason, philosophy i.e. the good old   modern or contemporary, colonial thought… I don’t come from that…

My daydream always returns to my grandmothers, my mothers, my brothers, my sisters, my aunts… For whom life, the act of living, is a daily adventure, full of surprise, joy, misgivings, sadness, genius, banality and frivolity.

Living… A courageous undertaking if you are black and African.

I want that… That weather, that keenness on how ‘heat affects the backyard garden’ or why rain allows this and that to happen: that tree and its shade and the gestures of the dance that are always in the air… So near, songs so near.

The poor… That is what theatre is, and why theatre could never disappear, as we will always have the poor if we have Africa.
The poor, a theatre of no fear, nothing to lose, no safety net. The poor, a daily practice in the art of those who DARE.
The poor, the joy of defying mosquitoes.
The arrival of an unexpected visitor, for whom you have no extra room but will make room for.
The poor, songs that shift pitch depending on who is doing the singing…

Why theatre…

Because it is about the dare of the poor.
We will always have the poor,
the poor, AFRICA…

We will always have…
Long live the free…

Nora Chipaumire is a choreographer and performer born in Zimbabwe and currently based in New York. With her work she challenges and embraces stereotypes of Africa and the black performing body. She is a Guggenheim scholar (2018) and three-time Bessie Prize winner.