The Desmond & Leah Tutu Lega­cy Foun­da­tion togeth­er with Ukrain­ian Asso­ci­a­tion of South Africa and NGO Resilient Ukraine are mark­ing the first year of the Russ­ian war on Ukraine with a dance per­for­mance titled “We Stand For Free­dom”.  

This 30-minute con­tem­po­rary dance per­for­mance, cre­at­ed by Ukrain­ian chore­o­g­ra­ph­er Katery­na Aloshy­na, is a space for live dia­logue between the dancers and audi­ence mem­bers on the sim­i­lar­i­ties in the Ukrain­ian and South African’s fight for free­dom. Via dig­i­tal tech­nolo­gies, the audi­ence makes choic­es that shape the out­come of the artis­tic con­ver­sa­tion. The piece also explores the human­i­tar­i­an cri­sis and the impact of the war on women and chil­dren, and how sol­i­dar­i­ty can lead to a safer world for all.  

“As young democ­ra­cies, both South Africa and Ukraine share and retain a tan­gi­ble con­nec­tion to the idea  of free­dom and jus­tice — ideals which we must nev­er take for grant­ed,” says Janet Job­son, CEO of the Tutu Lega­cy Foun­da­tion. She said, “The Arch remind­ed us often of the inter­con­nect­ed­ness of all human­i­ty — that ulti­mate­ly our futures are fun­da­men­tal­ly tied up in each oth­er. The injus­tices and atroc­i­ties being met­ed out to the Ukrain­ian peo­ple must be stopped imme­di­ate­ly.”

“The art speaks simul­ta­ne­ous­ly to the heads and hearts of every human.  In the “We Stand for Free­dom” per­for­mance, the dia­logue is between Ukraini­ans and South Africans as well as between dancers and the audi­ence. We hope that this dia­logue will result in actions that defend human rights and the search­ing and build­ing for peace,” explained Katery­na Aloshy­na, is the inten­tion of the per­for­mance. 

“Russ­ian inva­sion is open­ing up a pan­do­ra box where the bor­ders of sov­er­eign coun­tries are once again con­test­ed,” says Natali­ia Popovych, Chair­per­son of NGO Resilient Ukraine. “The human­i­tar­i­an con­se­quences of such aggres­sion are not con­fined to a dozen mil­lion of dis­placed peo­ple or tens of thou­sands civil­ian deaths, they affect com­mu­ni­ties around the world and those most vul­ner­a­ble suf­fer first. It is in the inter­est of South Africans and Ukraini­ans to fight for demo­c­ra­t­ic prin­ci­ples where peo­ple’s lives mat­ter and where jus­tice might become a real­i­ty.”

The per­for­mance will explore four blocks that address: 

• the human­i­tar­i­an cri­sis and the refugee chil­dren,
• the impact of war on women and fam­i­lies, 
• the impor­tance of free­dom and the right to choose for soci­eties,
• how sup­port­ing val­ues of free­dom, human rights and democ­ra­cy by the  glob­al com­mu­ni­ty con­tributes to a safer soci­ety for all.

The open­ing night will  be broad­cast­ed at the DLTLF and UAZA social media and will include a pan­el dis­cus­sion fol­low­ing the per­for­mance, with par­tic­i­pa­tion from civ­il soci­ety rep­re­sen­ta­tives, and Janet Job­son (CEO of the Desmond and Leah Tutu Lega­cy Foun­da­tion) and Katery­na Aloshy­na (chore­o­g­ra­ph­er and pres­i­dent of the Ukrain­ian Asso­ci­a­tion of South Africa). 

The broad­cast­ing will take place on 23 Feb­ru­ary 2023 18:00–19:00 

When: 24, 25 and 27 Feb­ru­ary 2023 at 17:00 and 19:00

Where: At the HCC Home­com­ing Cen­tre (Cor­ner Buitenkant St &, Cale­don St, Dis­trict Six, Cape Town, 8001) 

Tick­ets: https://www.quicket.co.za/events/207227-we-stand-for-freedom/

We Stand for Free­dom is a joint effort between  the Desmond and Leah Tutu Lega­cy Foun­da­tion, the Ukrain­ian Asso­ci­a­tion of South Africa and Resilient Ukraine.

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Biogra­phies of par­tic­i­pants

The Desmond and Leah Tutu Lega­cy Foun­da­tion 

Found­ed in 2013, the Desmond and Leah Tutu Lega­cy Foun­da­tion rep­re­sents one of the world’s most icon­ic lead­ers and his life-long part­ner. The Foun­da­tion strives to ensure their uncom­pro­mised brav­ery is cel­e­brat­ed, com­mu­ni­cat­ed and curat­ed for pos­ter­i­ty.

Vis­it www.tutu.org.za  

The Ukrain­ian Asso­ci­a­tion of South Africa 

Ukrain­ian Asso­ci­a­tion of South Africa (NPO 189–705) is a col­lab­o­ra­tive asso­ci­a­tion reg­is­tered in May 2017 that pro­motes net­works between Ukraini­ans and South Africans for mutu­al devel­op­ment, increased aware­ness and inner growth of indi­vid­u­als and soci­eties.

For more infor­ma­tion www.uaza.co.za or [email protected]

Resilient Ukraine 

Resilient Ukraine is a civ­il soci­ety organ­i­sa­tion ded­i­cat­ed to future-proof­ing Ukraine and the world by enabling it to con­tribute as an equal among demo­c­ra­t­ic nations towards secur­ing last­ing peace in Ukraine, Europe and glob­al­ly by coun­ter­ing Russ­ian war pro­pa­gan­da and dis­in­for­ma­tion by rais­ing aware­ness about the war and devel­op­ing cre­ative con­tent and mes­sag­ing that helps to unite and inform Ukraine’s cit­i­zens and allies around the world.

Katery­na Aloshy­na (Chore­o­g­ra­ph­er)

Ukrain­ian chore­o­g­ra­ph­er, direc­tor and co-founder of the Con­tem­po­rary Dance Lab­o­ra­to­ry Katery­na Aloshy­na likes to dis­cov­er this world through the lens of dance. Born in Ukraine, Katery­na was trained as a bal­le­ri­na and received a degree in chore­og­ra­phy. She has over 15 years of expe­ri­ence teach­ing bal­let and con­tem­po­rary danc­ing and  has spent the last five years in South Africa. Her recent works include:

“The For­est” inter­ac­tive per­for­mance for chil­dren | 2021 South Africa

“Show me your Christ­mas” poet­ry and dance per­for­mance | 2019 South Africa

“FENCE” con­tem­po­rary dance per­for­mance | 2019 South Africa, 2018 Ukraine

Cecil Etc (Music com­pos­er)

Cecil Etc is a musi­cian based in Cape Town, mak­ing eclec­tic music root­ed in melody and har­mo­ny. Born Deán de Klerk, he is clas­si­cal­ly-trained on the piano but draws inspi­ra­tion from all styles to com­pose. Hav­ing record­ed and released music for many years, his music can be found on all major media plat­forms.

 

Dancers:

Olwethu Sotiya 

Sotiya is a dancer, per­former, mem­ber and artis­tic direc­tor of Is’Thatha Dance Project, based in Nyan­ga. The project is a com­mu­ni­ty based NPO that strives to pro­mote local art and cul­ture, by cre­at­ing oppor­tu­ni­ties for the local, dis­ad­van­taged com­mu­ni­ty. It gives a chance to young local tal­ent to evolve, and find their feet and grow in this dif­fi­cult world.

 

Bian­ca Car­men Schulz Poblete

Dancer, per­former and co-founder of a cre­ative per­form­ing arts com­pa­ny based in Cape Town called [Em]bodied Cre­atives, Poblete is pas­sion­ate about the per­form­ing arts and devis­ing the­atre. She has an inter­est in dance, move­ment, the­atre cre­ation, chore­og­ra­phy, film/stage act­ing, voice over/ radio work, and phys­i­cal the­atre.

 

Beth McLach­lan-Evans

McLach­lan-Evans is a pro­fes­sion­al free­lance dance per­former in Cape Town focused on cre­ativ­i­ty, artistry and inter­dis­ci­pli­nary per­for­mance art. 

 

 

Ock­ert Prins  

Prins is a dancer and actor, with a range of col­lab­o­ra­tions with Jaz­zart Dance The­atre. He has per­formed at Bax­ter The­atre and the Sowe­to The­atre. He is also a hip hop dance teacher at the Rebirth Dance Com­pa­ny.

 

 

Cos­tumes: Natal­ka Kly­menko, Cape Town/Ukraine

Dec­o­ra­tion (props) by Olek­sii Kovalenko, Cape Town/Ukrainet

In this per­for­mance the record­ing of events organ­ised by the Bren­thurst Foun­da­tion, UAZA and Desmond and Leah Tutu Foun­da­tions; and frag­ments of the poet­ry of Man­di Vund­la and Jonas Siphokazi were used.