A new umbrella company is formed and after both founders/directors return from the Red Bull Entrepreneurial Academy. One takes off to USA to be inspired and developed by Obama’s Administration’s YALI leaving his partner holding the force.
Turning a passion such as performance or visual arts into a career may be considered a success
in itself. But Theo Ndindwa and Siphiwe Ngwenya have taken giant extra steps and have turned
their passion into a vehicle to effect change in their own communitties, as well as the greater South
African community.
This achievement has also come at the perfect moment, with the recent establishment of Arts
Township International, a partnership between Theo Ndindwa and Siphiwe Ngwenya.
Arts Township International (ATi) is an umbrella body to a diverse group of high-end community arts
projects and Organizations:
iKapa Dance Theatre – professional dance company, apprenticeship programs, dance training
operating in different communities.
The Maboneng Township Arts Experience - a national project that turns homes into permanent
art galleries and annual public arts festivals.
OnPointe Dance Studio - facilitates training, artistic management and international dance
commissions & exchanges as well as a wellness centre related to the performing arts.
Buntuzim Media Production - an enterprise propeller for artistic projects and interventions mostly
related to Media & Research.
To understand ATi’s work, imagine a township street that is vibrant and inviting with homes on
either side open all year round to visitors as galleries, performance spaces, museums, home
innovation laboratories and flowing with the sights, sounds and flavors’ of working people from the
community, the city and further abroad exchanging stories and ideas, foods, training, history and
culture.
Imagine the business concerns in each of these homes is operated sustainably by residents who are skilled in the contemporary production and curation of visual and performing arts and the effective management of co-operative businesses, with reciprocal access to a network of visitors, artists and other communities from around the city, the country and the world.
These are ATi’s Community Creative Districts. These creative districts are open to the public year round
and hold annual public arts festivals. Township creative districts are furthermore networked with
‘sister townships/communities’ from around Africa and the world at large broadening access for its
residents and artists to opportunities, ideas and resources from the international creative industries
and creating a viable ecosystem (ecological and economic) for the Arts to create meaningful
transformation in those communities.
