The legendary Handspring Puppet Company will be well represented at the annual Out the Box Festival of Puppetry and Visual Performance this year, when their extraordinary well-known 48 minute documentary, Making War Horse, will be screened at the Labia Cinema on Orange Street, as part of the Moving Things Film Festival.

Making War Horse relates the story of how Michael Morpurgo’s children’s novel became one of the most popular and acclaimed productions in the National Theatre’s history in the UK. From its early development in the NT’s studio, audiences will see how the Handspring Puppet Company created the groundbreaking techniques that brought a life-like horse to the stage. Going behind the scenes and into the rehearsal room, with featured interviews from the cast and creative team, Making War Horse documents this unique theatrical collaboration and the creation of an outstanding stage classic. The second film by Handspring will be Woycjek on the Highveld, a 90 minute filmed version of the company’s most widely travelled theatre production of the same name. The play received the Vita Award for Production of the Year of a New South African Play when it premiered in 1992 and it continues to be a favourite at theatre festivals.

Making War Horse will be shown on the 23rd March at 6pm, 26th March at 12pm and on the 28 March at 2pm when Basil and Adrian from Handspring will introduce the documentary and take questions from the audience.

For the full festival programme visit www.outtheboxfestival.com or call 021 462 5811 or buy your copy of The Big Issue for comprehensive festival info.

Each year Taste of Cape Town brings together the city’s most acclaimed restaurants and carefully selected exhibitors to attract 20 000 of Cape Town’s most dedicated and sophisticated foodies. This year the festival will again be held at Rhodes High School, Montreal Avenue, Mowbray.

From Wednesday the 24th, to Sunday the 28th of March, 19 of the Cape’s top restaurants and chefs will be serving a stunning selection of sample – sized signature dishes to Taste of Cape Town visitors.

Five of the featured restaurants participating in this year’s festival have been crowned in the prestigious Eat Out Awards list of Top Ten Restaurants in South Africa.

Participating restaurants include Jardine Restaurant, Maze by Gordon Ramsay, The Cape Colony Restaurant, Overture, Reuben’s,  Myoga Restaurant, Ginja and Gold to name just a few.     `

Taste of Cape Town offers an amazing array of entertainment features to ensure that the Taste of Cape Town visitors participate in every aspect of this ultimate gourmet eating and drinking experience.

The Pick n Pay Fresh Living Chef’s Theatre
A unique opportunity to see Cape Town’s top chefs showcased and in action on stage, featuring demos, culinary challenges, entertaining tutorials and enlightening Q & A sessions. Also a chance to meet the folk behind the award winning Fresh Living magazine.

The Checkers Wine Route
Back by popular demand, this year’s Checkers Wine Route Taste Experience is set to rock Cape Town. Clive Torr, along with some of South Africa’s leading wine makers, will be hosting a selection of wines from more than 80 top wine estates in South Africa. These wine experts and connoisseurs will host the Taste of Cape Town Wine Route, which will feature a daily programme of wine tastings, tutorials and advice on wine and food pairing.

The Grolsch Beer Academy
Will feature Beer Master classes by a renowned brew master. Following the Academy, the ‘thirst buds’ can be quenched in the comfortable and stylish surrounds of the outdoor Grolsch Beer Experience area.

Fresh Producer’s Market
As part of this year’s festival, we’ll be showcasing some of the Cape’s local food heroes – people who are passionate about their products and pour every ounce of their being intoproducing organic, delicious, flavourful produce and ingredients that inspire our chefs to get creative in the kitchen.

Johnnie Walker Whisky Theatre
This year at the Taste of Cape Town, The House of Johnnie Walker® invites you on a journey to explore the flavours of the world’s greatest whisky house. Taste the bold, vibrant, Red Label®, the deep and smokey Black Label®, the flagship House of Johnnie Walker® blend and the enigmatic natural flavours of Green Label® blended malt whisky.

Taste of Cape Town Kidz Zone
Now available at the festival…. a Kidz Zone will be hosted by Partytots & Clamber Club offering fun activities for all ages – jumping castles, obstacle course, face painting, balloon artist, fun characters, magic shows and loads more for the kiddies to do. Bring your children along to join us for a great day out!

Visit the Taste of Cape Town website for more details: www.tasteofcapetown.com/

Tickets can be purchased through computicket and booking in advance is advisable. Ticket prices range from R80 to R170.

The Out The Box Festival of Puppetry & Visual Performance is a visual feast of performances, workshops, talks, exhibitions and films that caters for adults and children alike. This year the event takes place at the Baxter Theatre Centre, The UCT Hiddingh campus in Gardens and the Labia Cinema on Orange Street.

For young audiences, artists present their wildest and most beautiful imaginings in works using puppetry, projection, objects, multi-media and live performers. When the sun sets and the little ones are tucked in bed, adult audiences are invited back to experience something completely different.

Included in the breath-taking line-up for the Adult Festival this year are international performance artists and contemporary dancers, Duda Paiva from the Netherlands and Angel and Edna Jaime from Mozambique. Some of the local works featured are the groundbreaking Quack! by FTH:K ; Acty Tang’s Inscrutable and the acclaimed Mothertongue Theatre’s The Baggage of Bags as well as several new works by new and emerging theatre makers.

So often it is childhood that comes to mind when thinking of puppetry and those wanting a family theatre experience won’t be disappointed. This year The Out The Box festival has created a Family Festival programme of puppetry and visual performance from around the globe featuring both overseas artists and preeminent Southern African youth theatre practitioners like Ubom from Grahamstown,  Arley’s Workshop from Durban and the remarkable Seka from Zambia.

For those who want to get more deeply immersed in the experience, a range of exciting workshops will be presented by specialists in the many diverse forms of puppetry, including a workshop by South Africa’s national treasure, Handspring Puppet Company.

Tickets cost from R30 to R50 via Computicket with special offers for block bookings of ten or more. For more info please visit
www2.outtheboxfestival.com/ or call 021 462 5811.

Get the full programme in your latest Big Issue now!

Frieda Lühl Jewellery

Design Indaba Expo is happening this weekend at the CTICC in Cape Town and with over 260 exhibitors, it promises to once again be a visual feast.

13 of our listed creatives are exhibiting at Design Indaba 2010 and from what we’ve heard, there will be some stunning and innovative new designs on show.

We’d like to wish Fundi Light & Living, Haldane Martin, The House of Hector, Streetwires Artist Collective, Urbanative Fine Jewels, Firepetals, Nuno Designs, Monkeybiz, Woo-men Plush Toys, Helen Vaughan, Frieda Lühl, Heath Nash and Imiso Ceramics best wishes for the weekend and may you enjoy great success!

Helen Vaughan Ceramics

To everyone else, this is definitely not an event to miss out on.The Design Indaba is South Africa’s number 1 expo for 100% local and original design products and concepts.

Tickets are R50 for adults, R30 for students and pensioners and R20 for scholars in uniform or children under 12 years of age.

Tickets can be purchased at computicket or at the door.

Doors open on Friday 26 February at 10:00. Opening Times each day are from 10:00 to 20:00 except for Sunday which closes at 18:00

Visit Design Indaba’s website for more details: www.designindaba.com/expo

Streetwires Artist Collective

The AVA in partnership with Spier invites you to the opening of WATERS – VESIÄ – AMANZI

Eunice Geustyn, Kristiina Korpela, Leena Mäki-Patola, Witty Nyide, Jaana Partanen and Jill Trappler

To be opened by Jesse Laitinen the program and consular officer for the Finnish embassy in Cape Town.

The opening is at 6pm on Monday, 08 March 2010

Exhibition closes on Wednesday, 31 March 2010 at 1 o clock pm

Jill Trappler

Eunice Geustyn

Waters – Vesiä – Amanzi brings together three Finnish artists living in Kuopio, surrounded by lakes, and three South African artists from Cape Town and Durban, living on the shore of oceans.

Water is the beginning of all life on earth and is a prerequisite for survival. Water separates and connects people. Each artist on the exhibition explores Water in a different way; there is social, environmental, elemental and personal commentary in a range of media from photography to ceramics, painting, paper work, print making, installation and video.

Association for Visual Arts Gallery
35 Church Street, Cape Town, South Africa
Gallery hours: Weekdays 10h00 to 17h00,
Saturdays 10h00 to 13h00
Phone: +27-21 424-7436,
Fax: +27-21 423-2637,
avaart@iafrica.com
www.ava.co.za

Fiona Gordon: Heads will be turned all over Cape Town’s city centre this week, as strangely dressed characters do even stranger things in and around the city’s public spaces.

In an effort to ‘encourage expression of creative thought’ Spier supports this public arts festival, ‘Infecting the City’, (curated by performance artist extraordinaire, Brett Bailey) as part of their community social investment.

With ‘Human Rites’ as the 2010 theme, and involvement from some of the city’s most prominent and prolific theatre-makers, it seems many of the pieces presented acknowledge aspects of this city’s rich and colourful history, and heritage combinations. This social art encourages different perspectives, and seems to seek to acknowledge the lives and struggles of others, and their impact on our presents, and futures.

I saw two pieces which used open spaces, which in itself from an accessibility and audience development perspective, is a great thing. But I was most grateful for the innovation of the third – a site-specific work that makes use of a monument as a performance space, in a way that some may deem disrespectful, but really to my mind, better fulfils the brief of ‘challenging us to think, reflect and communicate in uniquely powerful ways’.

It’s worth making an effort to attend some of the things on offer. Even if it’s just to watch the passers-by be forced to engage with the space, or happenings in it, in a different way than usual.

“Infection” may have negative connotations, but I certainly left my little sojourn in the city feeling inspired – infected with the positivity that comes from experiencing art.

And even the weather played along providing some of its own drama – threatening to rain out the second performance I saw, while I watched the third, a mere hour later, feeling the rays of the scorching sun. Ah, Cape Town…

Performances and installations happen daily 13-20 February, throughout the CBD, and are almost all free of charge. See www.infectingthecity.com for more details.

Fiona Gordon
fiona@artslink.co.za
www.artslink.co.za

STUTTERHEIME, PENELOPE
‘Sun Shines’, oil on canvas, 70 x 90 cm

The Everard Read Gallery, Cape Town is delighted to invite you to view new works by Penelope Stutterheime.
Please join them at 18:30 on Thursday 18th February at 3 Portswood Road, V&A Waterfront.

In her latest works, Stutterheime makes use of her distinctive impasto application of oil paint, carefully building up layers of vibrant colour to create a series of richly glowing paintings. With their thick and haptic quality, they reveal an exploration of the subconscious using fluid symbols and forms, to which viewers respond emotionally & experientially.

The exhibition concludes on the 4th March.
For more information, please contact: +27 21 418 4527
ctgallery@everard.co.za
www.everard-read-capetown.co.za

www.kalkbaymodern.com

The highly anticipated nominations for the prestigious annual Fleur du Cap Theatre Awards, taking place this year at the Baxter Theatre on the 21st March, have been announced. The panel of judges deliberated for two days and selected the following nominees for their outstanding work in productions throughout 2009. The fourteen judges are Marianne Thamm, Robert Greig, Zane Henry, Brent Meersman, Len Ashton, Peter Tromp, Dr. Beverley Brommert, Jill Markram, Wayne Muller, Denise Bester, Wilhelm Snyman, Marina Griebenow, Mariana Malan and Herman van der Westhuizen. The Nominees in the various categories follow:

Best Performance by an Actor / Beste Vertolking deur ‘n Akteur:
Jeremy Crutchley for his role as Charlotte von Mahlsdorf in I Am My Own Wife
Michael Richard for his role as Martin Vallon in God of Carnage
Scott Sparrow for his role as Petey in The Birthday Party
Scott Sparrow for his roles as Steve and Les in Decadence

Best Performance by an Actress / Beste Vertolking deur ‘n Aktrise:
Emily Child for her roles as Helen and Sybil in Decadence
Louise Saint-Claire for her role as Veronique Vallon in God of Carnage
Robyn Scott for her role as Elizabeth in Elizabeth: Almost by Chance a Woman
Sandra Prinsloo for her role as Magdaleen in Die Naaimasjien

Best Supporting Actor / Beste Ondersteunende Akteur:
Adrian Collins for his role as Stanley in The Birthday Party
Atandwa Kani for her role as Ariel in The Tempest
Guy de Lancey for his role as Melancholy Jacques in As you Like It
Mbulelo Grootboom for his several characters in Iago’s Last Dance

Best Supporting Actress / Beste Ondersteunende Aktrise:
Anna-Mart van der Merwe for her role as Annette Raleigh in God of Carnage
Claire Watling for her role as Madame le Beau and Audrey in As You like It
Erica Wessels for her role as Amanda in Private Lives
Gina Pauling for her role as Gwendolen Fairfax in The Importance of Being Ernest

Best Director / Beste Regisseur:
Alan Swerdlow for God of Carnage
Christopher Weare for Elizabeth: Almost by Chance a Woman
Hennie van Greunen for Die Naaimasjien
Janice Honeyman for I Am My Own Wife

Best Performance in a One Person Show / Beste Spel in ‘n Eenpersoonvertoning:
Jeremy Crutchley in I Am My Own Wife as Charlotte von Mahsdorf and multiple characters
Michael Richard in My Mother’s Italian, My Father’s Jewish and I’m in Therapy as multiple characters
Pumeza Rashe in Red Winter in Gugs as Qagamba
Sandra Prinsloo in Die Naaimasjien as Magdaleen

Jeremy Crutchley double nominee

Best New SA Script / Beste Nuwe SA Teks:
Transit by Ian Bruce
Noah of Cape Town by Graham Weir and Megan Choritz
Iago’s Last Dance by Mike van Graan
Die Naaimasjien by Rachelle Greef

Best Performance in a Musical / Beste Spel in ‘n Musiekblyspel:
Anton Luitingh as the Beast in Beauty and the Beast
Christine Weir as Maria in Noah of Cape Town
Jonathan Roxmouth as Gaston in Beauty and the Beast
Pauline Malefane as Deus / Jesus in The Mysteries

Best Performance in a Revue or Cabaret / Beste Spel in ‘n Revue of Kabaret:
Jonathan Roxmouth in A Handful of Keys as pianist/performer
Loukmaan Adams in Second Time Around as Yussie and Boeta Yu
Roelof Colyn in A Handful of Keys as pianist/performer
Fiona du Plooy and Candice D’Arcy in Angels on Horseback in multiple roles

Best Costume Design / Beste Ontwerp – Kostuums:
Dicky Longhurst for As You Like It
Illka Louw for The Tempest
Marcel Meyer for Private Lives
Penny Simpson for Elizabeth: Almost by Chance a Woman

Best Prop and/or Puppetry Design / Beste Ontwerp: Rekwisiete en/of Poppespelkuns:
Dicky Longhurst for I Am My Own Wife for the props
Janni Younge for Pictures of You for the masks
Janni Younge for Quack for the masks
Janni Younge for The Tempest for the puppets

Quack with masks made by triple nominee Janni Younge

Best Lighting Design / Beste Beligtingsontwerp:
Fahiem Bardien for As You Like It
Mannie Manim for I Am My Own Wife
Mannie Manim for The Tempest
Rob Murray for Pictures of You

Best Set Design / Beste Stelontwerp:
Alfred Rietman for The Tent
Dicky Longhurst for I Am My Own Wife
Dicky Longhurst for Noah of Cape Town
Illka Louw for The Tempest

Most Promising Student Award / Mees Belowende Student:
Hannah Borthwick from the University of Stellenbosch
Wessel Pretorius from the University of Stellenbosch
Wilhelm van der Walt from the University of Stellenbosch
Ebrahim Gordon from the University of Cape Town

Four special awards will be announced at the ceremony on Sunday 21st March. They are the Rosalie van der Gucht Prize for New Directors; the Award for Innovation in Theatre that is awarded to an individual, company or organisation working onstage or behind the scenes that has delivered work of excellence and made a contribution to theatre and its development; the Special Lifetime Achievement Award that will go to an individual who has over many years made a significant contribution to theatre, on or off stage; and the popular Peoples’ Choice Award, where theatre fans vote online at www.capetheatre.co.za for their favourite 2009 production, with the deadline for voting being 15th March 2010.

The Fleur du Cap Theatre Awards , under the auspices of Distell’s Corporate Social Investment programme, will once again be a glamourous occasion where the stars of the stage mingle with the audience on the red carpet. Tickets cost R150 per person via Computicket and include canapes, Fleur du Cap wines and bubbly, with all funds raised through box office sales going towards the development of the Performing Arts in South Africa. For more information and to vote, visit www.capetheatre.co.za

INFECTING THE CITY (ITC) the Spier Public Arts Festival hits the streets of Cape Town for its third year from the 13th- 20th February.

Get out of your comfort zone and engage with exciting large-scale site-specific performance art pieces, choreographic works, installations and low-key interventions. Intriguing participating artists come from South Africa, Zimbabwe, China, the UK, the USA, Greece, Germany, Australia and the Netherlands. A wealth of diversity, viewpoints and talent.

ITC 2010 is themed ‘Human Rite’, asking artists to refigure the public spaces of the inner city as arenas in which we confront some of our demons and attempt to put them to rest. To seek out silent memories and invisible stories and celebrate them. To look for what needs to be righted, and ’rited’.

Witness the new creative voice of 21st century urban Africa. The full programme is available on www.infectingthecity.com.

For further information please contact Felicia Pattison-Bacon on 021 422 0468 or email feliciapb@africacentre.net