Tag: creative economy

African Theatre Becomes European Success

Post author By David South Consulting
Post date 16/01/2023
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By David South, Development Challenges, South-South Solutions

In Britain, the country that gave the world the plays of William Shakespeare (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/William_Shakespeare), a new creative force has taken stages by storm: African theatre. And it is proving how economically rewarding Southern culture can be.

“African theatre is very eclectic and very narrative driven, which I think appeals to audiences. Here (the United Kingdom) it’s very much more reflective and intellectual,” director Nick Kent told The Independent newspaper.

Over the last decade, the world’s creative industries have gained greater recognition as an important spark that can drive economic development and entrepreneurship. World exports of creative products were valued at US $424.4 billion in 2005 as compared to US $227.5 billion in 1996, according to UNCTAD figures. It has grown by 8.8 percent a year between 1996 and 2005 (UNCTAD).

In Germany, more than 35 million people go to almost 110,000 theatre performances – not including opera and ballet – every year. That’s almost half the population.

The creative economy is seen as a fast growth area and good job creator, and importantly, a lynchpin of cultural identity and diversity. While the creative economy flourishes in North America and Europe, Southern countries are still not reaping its full benefits. Despite their cultural diversity and richness, out of 132 developing countries, 85 have never produced a commercial film.

UNESCO, through its Global Alliance for Cultural Diversity, has been in the forefront of helping African countries re-shape their policies to take this into consideration. The promotion of cultural industries also has been incorporated into the New Partnership for Africa’s Development (NEPAD).

Kent, the artistic director of London’s Tricycle Theatre, believes the popularity of African theatre is a product of its vibrancy and the fact both music and stories’ narratives engage with difficult topics.

“Since the apartheid era (in South Africa), African theatre has been more engaged socially,” continues Kent. “South Africa has managed to capture music and storytelling.”

Nigeria’s Nobel Prize-winning playwright Wole Soyinka packed Britain’s National Theatre recently by tackling tensions in colonial Nigeria in his play Death and the King’s Horseman. Another Nigerian play is Iya-lle (The First Wife), about a chief’s preparations for his wife’s 40th birthday. It runs at London’s Soho Theatre.

Yet another success is a re-telling stories from the Bible called The Mysteries – Yiimimangaliso — by the South African theatre company Isango Portobello. It was such a huge success when it first appeared on London’s stages in 2002, it will be returning in September.

One way companies in countries like Britain use to introduce audiences to new cultures and creative experiences is to run a special ‘season.’ In April, London’s Tricycle Theatre began a season of 12 plays about Afghanistan by a variety of writers. They were divided into half-hour mini-plays that could be seen in parts over several evenings or in a weekend marathon of 12 plays.

The project was so successful that the Tricycle is starting a South Africa season, beginning with the play Karoo Moose, an award-winning story about a girl’s struggle to survive in a village with the help of an escaped moose. Another play in the season is Koos Sas: Last Bushman of Montagu, a musical about a heroic rebel.

West Africa features in the play The Observer, also at London’s National Theatre. It tells the story of an election observer forced to rubber-stamp the victory of a corrupt president. Lost in the Stars, a musical adaptation of the novel Cry, the Beloved Country – a global success in the 1940s – explores racial tensions in apartheid South Africa and runs at the Queen Elizabeth Hall.

“African theatre addresses issues of identity and conflict,” said Dr .Yvette Hutchison, who lectures in African theatre at the University of Warwick.”Because of its history, there is much to explore. “European theatre became very intellectual and rational after the Enlightenment. African theatre remains spiritual and metaphysical. There is also less formality – the audience expects to contribute.”

The fresh perspective brought by African theatre is its appeal.

“I do think people have become tired of formulaic music in theatre,” said the British-born South African director of The Mysteries, Mark Dornford-May.

“African culture will incorporate, for example, Mozart and a work song, and perceive them as equally valid, or perhaps favour the work song. There’s also a lot of physicality. The audience expects to be engaged. In Europe you sit in your seat and don’t have contact with anyone and you may as well be watching a DVD. There’s a sense of excitement in African theatre and exuberance of performance.”

Published: July 2009

Resources

The British Council sponsors numerous awards for international creatives. Website: www.creativeconomy.org.uk

Creative Clusters: Creative Clusters is an independent policy conference examining the growth of the creative economy. It is interested in initiatives from around the world that are designed to have an impact in both cultural and economic terms. Website: www.creativeclusters.com

Iroko Theatre Company: The theatre uses traditional African theatre art forms to explore social issues that are of interest to children and young people and in doing so help them to experience new cultures and art forms. Website:www.irokotheatre.org.uk/index.html

A BBC story on the success of African theatre. Website: www.bbc.co.uk/africabeyond/africanarts/18625.shtml

Development Challenges, South-South Solutions was launched as an e-newsletter in 2006 by UNDP’s South-South Cooperation Unit (now the United Nations Office for South-South Cooperation) based in New York, USA. It led on profiling the rise of the global South as an economic powerhouse and was one of the first regular publications to champion the global South’s innovators, entrepreneurs, and pioneers. It tracked the key trends that are now so profoundly reshaping how development is seen and done. This includes the rapid take-up of mobile phones and information technology in the global South (as profiled in the first issue of magazine Southern Innovator), the move to becoming a majority urban world, a growing global innovator culture, and the plethora of solutions being developed in the global South to tackle its problems and improve living conditions and boost human development. The success of the e-newsletter led to the launch of the magazine Southern Innovator.

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ORCID iD: https://orcid.org/0000-0001-5311-1052.

© David South Consulting 2022

Tags African Theatre Becomes European Success, creative economy, David South Consulting, Development Challenges, development challenges south-south solutions, July 2009, Published: July 2009, South-South Solutions, Southern Innovator magazine, theatre, UNDP, UNOSSC

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Southern Art Hubs Grab Attention for Creative Economy

Post author By David South Consulting
Post date 23/11/2022
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By David South, Development Challenges, South-South Solutions

SOUTH-SOUTH CASE STUDY

Regeneration – of poor neighbourhoods, districts, even whole countries after a conflict – is both a challenge and a key to transforming lives. One approach that has a track record is turning to artists and creative people to re-imagine a neighbourhood or country’s culture, and restore pride and vitality to places beaten down by life’s hardships.

The tool to do this is the creative economy. The “interface between creativity, culture, economics and technology in a contemporary world dominated by images, sounds, texts and symbols” (UNCTAD) is seen as away for emerging economies to leapfrog into high-growth areas in the world economy.

Two approaches offer inspiring examples: a Brazilian art gallery owner is single-handedly remaking the Brazilian market for contemporary art. And in Cambodia, a new wave of young artists are creating a stir in the global art scene.

Galeria Leme (http://www.galerialeme.com/home.php?lang=ing) is located in a graffiti-strewn, down-at-heel neighbourhood in Sao Paulo, Brazil.

Brazil has seen impressive economic growth in the past decade. The country is Latin America’s biggest economy and had reached growth of 5.1 percent in 2008 before being hit by the global recession.

The gallery pursues several goals at once: its mission is to draw attention to socially and politically engaging contemporary Brazilian art, but it also aims to increase awareness of the art market in Brazil and help in the revitalization of the gallery’s neighbourhood.

The gallery is a concrete box designed by Paulo Mendes da Rocha (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Paulo_Mendes_da_Rocha), an award-winning Brazilian architect. Founded in 2004 by former banker Eduardo Leme, the gallery has fashioned itself into being the leading authority on contemporary art in Brazil. Leme used to work in the financial sector before moving into running a gallery, and has applied his understanding of markets and how to create demand.

This in turn has grabbed international attention, and had the global art world beating a path to this neighbourhood. In short, it creates a buzz that soon feeds on itself and draws in more people to the scene.

It’s a formula that has worked well in many other places, where a successful gallery fosters a scene and draws in audiences, buyers and new businesses. Soon, a creative economy comes alive and that means serious money. Both New York and London have shown how this can work. In New York City, the creative economy employs over 278,000 people (2002).

Sao Paulo is the commercial hub of Brazil’s contemporary art market. But previously, buyers had to search all over the city to find the works they wanted to buy.

“I think it is a really good moment for Brazilian art,” Leme said.”Brazilian art is fantastic. Due to our miscellaneous (sic) of culture and people and all these kind of things. Brazil is almost a continent. You have art made of wood, made of metal, made of plastic films, all the materials. More and more, I am seeing Brazilians moving onto the international markets, the prices are moving up. The number of fellows from museums that are coming down here to see what’s going on, it’s fantastic.

“To run this business you not just to have good stuff: you need to understand to whom you should sell also,” Leme told the magazine Monocle. “I mean also not just Sao Paulo is a rich and big city that you have a lot of collectors. There is a lot of social stuff you have to understand to be in this specific business.

“My challenge is to increase the Brazilian market. I have this kind of ambition. More partners, more people talking about art, if more people talking about art I am going to receive more feedback and I am going to grow the terms. Not just as a business but also as a man I will have more things on my mind, more information. And the financial market, the more money you make the richest you are. Here, it is not just that: my point of view is that the more challenge is the thing, the more goals I make I am going to be richer in this business.”

Another scene has taken off in formerly war-ravaged Cambodia in Southeast Asia. The country was notorious for the horrors of the Killing Fields in the 1970s (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Killing_Fields), where the extremist Khmer Rouge government executed people and Cambodian artists suffered greatly. As a result, the art community was devastated for many years.

Thirty years on, a new generation of artists has emerged from the recent years of peace. This new wave is getting attention across Asia for its innovation.

Artist Pich Sopheap is one of the pioneers. By founding the Cambodian contemporary art association saklapel.org with Linda Saphan, he has focused the Cambodian art scene through group exhibitions and promotion. Another tool he uses to build the scene up has been the Visual Art Open(VAO), an annual event since 2005 featuring work by Cambodian artists.

This has had the effect of building a strong community of artists within the country who can support each other. It also makes it easier for outside art buyers to discover who is working in the country’s art scene.

Sopheap works in a variety of media including oil painting, photography and sculpture. He manipulates bamboo and rattan to shape his sculptures.

“I think for me sculpture with this material is just because it is cheap. It’s easy to use, it is very relevant. The subject matter is in the work already. For me it is discovering new forms that resonant with the atmosphere, with the conditions of this country,” Sopheap told the BBC.

Sopheap’s family fled from the Khmer Rouge in the 1970s. He spent his early life in the United States, where he trained in art. When he returned to Cambodia a few years ago, he found the art scene very small and weak.

“Cambodia is a young country when it comes to modern art. It takes a while for new blood to come back and actually make something that concerns the present time,” believes Sopheap. “And we are very young, in our early 30s. Before that there was almost none that was known. We are making our own way – it is all up to us. We show in different cafes, we show in bars, we show in gift shops. And when we do those kind of exhibitions it is kind of exciting, it is not really a gallery, a cold place, people go by and it exposes to a lot of foreigners.”

A Cambodian-trained artist, Leang Seckon (http://saklapel.org/vao/artists/leang_seckon/), takes these approaches further, using sewing, painting, metalwork and collage in ways that reference Cambodian traditions, from apsara ballet (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Apsara_Dance) to fortune-telling, while subtly commenting on modern culture, society and politics. Seckon now has shows in Britain, Japan and Norway, and has become one of the country’s most successful artistic exports.

“To begin with I was not a professional artist and I didn’t realize I could jump from low to high level so fast. Things have changed so quickly for me. If I do one style of art it makes me feel so bored. But if I mix it up with other techniques like sewing and collage, it makes it more interesting for me. I don’t know if you can call that real Cambodian art but I didn’t copy or learn it from anyone: I created it myself.”

“This is a very important point for me: I can show all my work to the international community. In the countries I go to, I tell them the same thing. Cambodia has new, young artists – we haven’t disappeared: the young ones have been growing up.”

His approach is to stay away from cliched Cambodian art.

“I just think we work really hard,” says Sopheap on the group’s success to date. “I just think we work really hard and get together and organize exhibitions ourselves for the most part. It is just artists working hard and they are hungry and they are fearless and when that energy is happening, people from the outside start to actually pronounce our name correctly and afterward they come to town and just by accident they find this little scene, and they are very interested in it because it is raw.”

Published: December 2009

Resources

Global Creative Economy Convergence Summit 2009: The summit is about the successful and emerging creative technologies and initiatives that are driving economic growth locally, nationally and internationally. Website: http://www.gcecs2009.com/
Creative Economy Report 2008. An economic and statistical assessment of creative industries world-wide as well as an overview of how developing countries can benefit from trade in creative products and services produced by UNCTAD and the Special Unit for South-South Cooperation in UNDP. Website: http://www.unctad.org/en/docs/ditc20082cer_en.pdf
An article about artists in the Caribbean and how they are using online networks to connect and earn income. Website: http://globalvoicesonline.org/2009/07/23/trinidad-and-tobago-online-art-networks/

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ORCID iD: https://orcid.org/0000-0001-5311-1052.

© David South Consulting 2022

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Popular Characters Re-invent Traditional Carving

Post author By David South Consulting
Post date 22/11/2022
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By David South, Development Challenges, South-South Solutions

SOUTH-SOUTH CASE STUDY

The popular cartoon characters from the long-running series The Simpsons are breathing new life into traditional African stone carvings.

A traditional craft in many cultures, carving adds value to local resources and provides an excellent source of income for local artisans and entrepreneurs. While wood or stone carvings are a popular tourist souvenir throughout Africa, Asia and Latin America, most carvers stick to traditional subjects.

However, a group of villagers in western Kenya have transformed their economy by swapping carvings of elephants and Cleopatra for Homer, Marge and Sideshow Bob.

According to the book Carving out a Future by the Centre for International Forestry Research (CIFOR), carving exports from the island of Bali in Indonesia total US $100 million per year. India’s industry is worth US $65 million. In Oaxaca, Mexico, carvings earn US $2,500 per household, increasing access to education and health. In Kenya, carving involves more than 60,000 people and provides household income for more than 300,000. In some communities in South Africa, households can earn between US $500 and US $2,000 per year from carvings – 80 per cent of a household income.

Research into carving has identified several factors that are critical to maximising profits: quality is critical, and the best woods and stone must be used. Diversity is an important element: too much of the same thing being made available damages the market. And sustainability: the wood and stone resources must not be used up.

It is this novelty and diversity that The Simpsons carvings address. By tapping into the global market for official licensed merchandise, the Tabaka carvers of the Abagusi tribe – well-known carvers in western Kenya – have significantly increased their income. And they are cashing in on the global popularity of the first Simpsons movie released this year.

Tabaka is a village three hours by bus from Kenya’s capital, Nairobi. In Nairobi, the carvers would sell their soap stone carvings to middlemen, often for a pittance compared to what they would in turn charge tourists. Negotiations with these vendors could take days and waste the precious income of the carvers as they waited around for the deal to come through.

Craft Village UK has organised the carvers to produce Simpsons statuettes for the worldwide market. The carvers were able to win the official merchandise license from The Simpsons’ owners, Twentieth Century Fox, after its vice-president saw a video of the carvers. They were initially awarded the license to craft 12 of the show’s characters for the US and UK markets, but last month they gained the worldwide license.

Craft Village’s founder, UK-based Paul Young, had the idea three years ago when his sister returned from living in Uganda with soap stone carvings. Impressed by the quality of the workmanship, he thought they would sell better in a western market if they reproduced popular images from films and TV. In 2005, he made contact with the carvers through a crafts company in Nairobi. He sent initial plastic figurine models and photos to help the carvers get the statues right. He flew to Kenya in 2005 to meet the carvers for the first time and video the carving process.

Initial prototypes were too heavy and some would break. And it took 12 months of trial and error to get the quality high enough to approach Twentieth Century Fox.

“Familiarizing the carvers with The Simpsons was difficult,” said Young. “Making the carvers understand the importance of quality control and the need for benchmark standards and uniform carvings was – and still is – a challenge.”

“I don’t know who they are,” said Pauline Kemunto, who helps her husband with the carvings. “But I like them because I earn from them.”

In a community known for growing bananas, David Atang’a, master carver and former soldier, supports five children. “If this Simpsons project succeeds, I hope to educate my children in university,” he said.

Two groups of 15 members each are divided between Tabaka Master Carvers and Tabaka Classic Carvers. Women take over and wash, polish and shine the pieces. Each piece is numbered and signed (Craft Village UK products).

The carvers now make 450 Kenyan shillings per statue (UK £3) – between four and six times what they would have got for a traditional carving. Where work before was sporadic, it is now regular and employs 80 people. The extra income means the carvers can now send their children to secondary school.

Enosh Onsombi grew up with no electricity and no television. But since the community started carving the Simpsons characters, “Life has changed so much,” he told The Independent newspaper. “The Simpsons has changed everything.”

Published: October 2007

Resources

Nonprofit Enterprise and Self-sustainability Team (NESsT):works in emerging markets by “developing and supporting social enterprises that strengthen civil society organizations’ financial sustainability and maximize their social impact.”

This work is licensed under a
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ORCID iD: https://orcid.org/0000-0001-5311-1052.

© David South Consulting 2022

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Book Boom Rides Growing Economies and Cities

Post author By David South Consulting
Post date 17/11/2022
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By David South, Development Challenges, South-South Solutions

SOUTH-SOUTH CASE STUDY

Along with growing economies, the global South is seeing growing numbers of readers and a newly flourishing publishing industry. The creative economy – of which book publishing is part – is experiencing a jolt from a combination of expanding economies and urbanizing cities. Just as the first settled cities of ancient Mesopotamia (today’s Iraq) spawned literature and learning, so the rapidly urbanizing South is changing dynamics and creating the space and demand for books.

The creative economy is seen as the “interface between creativity, culture, economics and technology in a contemporary world dominated by images, sounds, texts and symbols” (UNCTAD). It has been shown to be an effective way for emerging economies to leapfrog into high-growth areas in the 21st century world economy.

Telling stories about local conditions and people’s rapidly changing lives is proving a commercial success formula. Fast-growing India is forecast to become the largest market for English language books within a decade. India’s economic boom, which saw 6.7 percent growth in 2009, and its expanding middle class are driving demand for books. India saw the number of literate people pass 66 percent by 2007.

“It is a forward-looking generation,” said Manish Singh, country manager for publisher Harlequin Mills and Boon, to The Guardian newspaper.

Estimates of India’s book reading market put the number of readers at just 5 million out of a population of over 1 billion people. But according to Anantha Padmanabhan, the director of sales in India for publisher Penguin, “that is set to increase dramatically.”

A survey by Tehelka (http://www.tehelka.com) found Indians are favouring stories about local conditions and set in the places where they live.

India’s most popular current writer is Chetan Bhagat, a former investment banker. He has sold more than 3 million books in the last five years. His latest, Two States, sold a million copies in four months.

Bhagat writes about the country’s aspiring middle class. His publisher, Rupa (http://www.rupapublications.com/Client/home.aspx), believes he appeals to a “pan-Indian, pan-age group.”

Bhagat puts his success down to the way the stories are written. “This is not like the mature English literature market,” he said. “It needs an English that is highly accessible, simple, and with stories that are still interesting and relevant.”

Book prices in India have stayed affordable for the middle classes. A book can cost from US $1.85 to US $2.65 for a paperback – still a high cost for the poor, however, who live on a dollar a day.

In Egypt, around 30 percent of the population is illiterate and book reading has been historically very low: it has been claimed an average literate Egyptian reads a quarter of a page of a novel per year. From this low base, a best seller only needs to sell a few thousand copies.

However, in Egypt small-scale independent publishers are starting to make an impact. Mohamed Hashem – founder of the Dar Merit publishing house (http://www.zoominfo.com/Search/ReferencesView.aspx?PersonID=1007104230) – has built from scratch in 12 years one of the country’s most critically acclaimed publishers: all from a tiny apartment in a rundown Cairo building.

“We can’t compete with the big firms in terms of profits,” he told The Guardian, “but the new wave of authors will always be sitting here. Yes, we have poverty and limited resources. But we also have the future.”

Launched to counter what Hashem felt was an unimaginative book market, his stable of authors have shaken up the Arabic fiction world. The global success of Alaa al-Aswany’s The Yacoubian Building (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Yacoubian_Building) is proof Hashem’s gamble on edgy talent was correct: rejected by two government-run publishing houses, the book went on to be a hit in English and Arabic and has been made into a film.

Hashem is being credited with unleashing a wave of new talented authors that has pushed literature out from being the preserve of a select group.

One of its successful authors, Hamdi Abu Golayyel – winner of the country’s top literary prize, the Naquib Mahfouz medal – believes “Merit has changed the way pioneering literature emerges in Egypt.”

“Before, you had the innovative writers – there are normally no more than five or six in a generation – meeting together in mutual isolation, because popular opinion rejected them.”

Merit “had the drive and ambition to support and distribute new and younger authors properly. Today innovative writing is wanted by the people.”

Hashem’s secret in attracting talented writers has been more than just business savvy: he also gives them “the freedom to write in my own way,” according to writer Ahmed Alaidy.

The writers also have a credibility advantage: they are writing about their circumstances rather than just imagining what it would be like. Writer Hani Abdel Mourid comes from Cairo’s traditional garbage-collecting neighbourhood; another author, Mohamed Salah Al Azab, has written a book named after the folding seats on Egypt’s lively minibuses.

Demographic changes and Cairo’s relentless expansion are being cited as the catalyst for the new writing.

“The fact that the city has grown the way it has,” says Samia Mehrez, a literature professor in Cairo, “the fact that what we used to call the periphery is now the centre, that is very important.”

“The year we started, we published five titles and the number of people interested could be counted in the dozens,” he told The Guardian. “Now we have 600 titles under our belt, and thousands are interested. It’s my duty to try and expand that circle. We’re chipping away at a wall, and slowly we’re making progress.”

Published: May 2010

Resources

1) Creative Economy Report 2008. An economic and statistical assessment of creative industries world-wide as well as an overview of how developing countries can benefit from trade in creative products and services produced by UNCTAD and the Special Unit for South-South Cooperation in UNDP. Website: http://www.unctad.org/en/docs/ditc20082cer_en.pdf

2) Global Creative Economy Convergence Summit 2009: The summit is about the successful and emerging creative technologies and initiatives that are driving economic growth locally, nationally and internationally. Website: http://www.gcecs2009.com/

3) A directory of Indian publishers. Website: http://www.publishersglobal.com/directory/publishers-by-country.asp?publishers-of=India

4) Full Circle Publishing: A successful Indian publishing company. Website: http://www.atfullcircle.com/

5) Jaipur Literature Festival: Described as the ‘greatest literary show on Earth’, the Jaipur Literature Festival is a sumptuous feast of ideas.The past decade has seen it transform into a global literary phenomenon having hosted nearly 2000 speakers and welcoming over a million book lovers from across India and the globe. Website: https://jaipurliteraturefestival.org/