The Writers Lab in association with DiArtskonageng and Independent Theatre makers, present TWL Reading Festival 2019. The festival which will feature eight new plays will be held at Tin Town Theatre, Marshalltown, Johannesburg. Tin Town Theatre, is a vibrant new space; that is set to inspire Independent artists.
The eight plays for the reading festival were selected from more than 200 submissions. The process started with a June callout for original works by South African writers. The line-up includes a widely diverse and artistically challenging group of playwrights; all eight are talented. Their plays echoing our turbulent times.
“The Festival includes everything that’s exciting about stories that engage and enrage us” says Eddie Thaba, a reader and selector of the works.
Through the reading festival; The Writers Lab in association with DiArtskonageng are offering South African writers an opportunity to be published. The Writers Lab was founded with a range of objectives, one of which is to (re)write our history by invoking the latent talents of young and old writers alike.
The plays will be presented though staged readings. Reading Festival is a wonderful opportunity for artists to have their unpublished works presented before an audience, by a cast consisting of professional actors. Actors will read aloud from scripts, incorporating minimal stage movement without costumes or sets. These presentations are followed by a community conversation with the writers and casts. The festival will happen on Saturday, November 23, 2019.
“The plays allow young and old to imagine the power of the individual to fight back, that make you laugh, make you feel deeply, and take you on a journey to possibilities of being,” says Thaba.
THE PLAYS
Above the Soil by Sisekho Velelo
Still by Olivia Fischer
The Soccerites by Shamin Chibba
The Chanting Youth by Ronald Manganye
This is How We Wait Here by Neo Sibiya
Zips and Scissors by Khutjo Green
The Way to a Man’s Heart by Refiloe Lepere
First by Jade Beeby
Festival details
Venue: The Tin Town Theatre (4 Margaret Mancinga Street, Ferreirasdorp, Johannesburg)
Date: 23 November 2019
Time: 10 AM
Cost of Tickets: R50
For more information contact:
Katlego Chale
Chairperson: Writers Lab
Email: thewriterslabpta@gmail.com
Cell: 061 408 2034
ABOUT WRITERS LAB
The Writers Lab is a collective of young creatives with a vision of building new literary and performance based works. We provide a space for young creatives to develop new works through brainstorming, concept development sessions, and readings of works in progress, staging, screening, publishing and distribution. The collective includes scholars; students, academics and young people with a desire to create. It is a community of writers developing the practice of writing, building and reading together.
ABOUT DiArtskonageng
We are a theatre company...well, we like that idea and we pursue it, persistently and quietly...we make theatre and hope to one day unmake theatre, we teach/learn theatre, we love stories and sketches in particular make our spirit sing...we publish plays...our aim is self-validation...we tend to validate narratives that are self-affirming, in the broadest possible sense...we generally exist outside of the ‘industry’ and have very loud feelings about that notion. We do it for ourselves and we have total control of what we put out there and how...we are diArtskonageng
