Officially speaking….
The dynamic young organisation, which this year celebrated its sixth birthday, moves into the next phase of growth with a strong focus on its education programmes including the Artsbridge International Exchange. In addition, the creative team will enjoy new artistic mentorship under the guidance of company member Jayne Batzofin, who has been with the company since 2009. Batzofin takes over the role of Artistic Director, and overseeing the company’s education and creative output, from founder and current Artistic Director Rob Murray, who is taking up the position of resident director with Janet Buckland’s Ubom! Company in Grahamstown.
“The first six years have been an exhilarating rollercoaster ride,” says Murray. “We have toured extensively nationally and internationally, won multiple awards and developed a ground-breaking theatre education programme for Deaf learners.
“It is now time to consolidate what has been created and build on that foundation to nurture a sustainable theatre training programme that provides opportunities to Deaf learners from all over the country. FTH:K is today an established entity in itself and has at its helm a strong new leadership team to take it into the next five years. “
Murray will be working with Batzofin as part of the handover which will also see Batzofin taking over as South African director of the Artsbridge International Exchange programme. Artsbridge is a two-year skills and cultural exchange project between Deaf and hearing communities in South Africa and the USA. It involves workshops, discussions and the creation of a work with Wings Theatre Company from the USA, which will be performed at QuestFest in Washington DC in March, followed by a national tour of South Africa. Batzofin was part of the team that travelled to the USA this year as part of the first phase of the project.
Company Director Tanya Surtees, who relocated to Washington DC earlier this year, will head up the Artsbridge Exchange from abroad while also working for QuestFest hosts, Quest Visual Theatre. She will remain on with FTH:K in an advisory capacity supporting Ana Lemmer, who joined FTH:K in March, in her new role as Company Director from 2012.
“It remains an honour to work for FTH:K, brokering the Exchange from the DC side and working to get the Company onto the international stage. It is humbling to see how over the years FTH:K has grown bigger than the vision of any one of its members or co-founders, and it is particularly satisfying to see new faces joining the family, fresh voices emerging in both leadership and creative roles, and old faces moving on to tackle new challenges.” says Surtees.
“2012 also marks the next phase of our Tell-Tale Signs education programme. The national tour next year with Artsbridge will include workshops that serve as an audition process for our next intake of trainees. This will be the first time we have been able to potentially offer places to students from outside of Cape Town. 2013 will mark the start of the three-year Deaf training programme, as well as a run of our latest production, Benchmarks, which won a Handspring Puppetry award,” says Murray.
“I am honoured to be working with Ubom! next year and, as a Rhodes graduate who studied under Andrew Buckland, I feel lucky to be returning to my theatrical roots.”
Joining Murray at Ubom! is company member Liezl de Kock who has been with FTH:K since 2006. Fleur du Cap-nominated actress de Kock will continue to perform her acclaimed roles in productions such as Pictures of You, Womb Tide and Benchmarks.
Batzofin graduated from Wits University Cum Laude with a BADA (Honours): majoring in directing and stage and costume design. She first met FTH:K in 2007 but was on her way to study for two years at the Jacques Lecoq School in Paris. On her return to South Africa, she joined the FTH:K team and has performed in and designed their highly acclaimed productions such as Womb Tide and Benchmarks. She has also played an integral role in the development of the Tell-Tale Signs programme as well as devised, designed and directed productions such as Shortcuts for the national schools tour.
“I am looking forward to working with the FTH:K team in my new role and helping to take the company to even greater heights,” says Batzofin. “It is a privilege to take over the mantle from Rob, and build on the outstanding work that he and the company have done to lay the foundations for the next five years.”
*FTH:K is a young, ground-breaking theatre company that works in the field of Visual Theatre. Without a dependency on any one language, its work crosses over cultural and linguistic divides and calls on audiences to “Listen With Your Eyes”. It has already won multiple awards, toured all over South Africa, Germany and Argentina, and in only 6 years, has reached more than 47 000 people.
More than that, FTH:K is South Africa’s premier Deaf and hearing theatre company with the goal of integrating the Deaf into the performing arts world in South Africa. This aim is best illustrated through its unique Tell-Tale Signs programme which is currently training South Africa’s first generation of Deaf artists for inclusion in the professional performing arts industry. There is currently no other project like it (nor has there ever been) running in South Africa.
FTH:K works include its award-winning performances of Pictures of You and Benchmarks (in association with a conspiracy of clowns), GUMBO, and its multi-award-nominated QUACK! and Womb Tide.
Perhaps you have heard by now that FTH:K won’t be at the National Arts Festival this year. If not, now you know! This was difficult decision for us to take because we haven’t missed a Festival…well…ever, but something we have learnt along the way is that sometimes “No” is the right answer. And this realisation was particularly hard to come to – after all, FTH:K’s history is peppered with enthusiastic “Yes!”’s, which we’re proud of because they have taken us to places that we would never have gone to and offered us opportunities that we would never have had otherwise. But gradually, in our annual Strategic Planning sessions, this idea of “We need to learn how to say no” raised its head. First apologetically, but over time more insistently until we knew we had to listen! We weren’t that small group anymore than could pack up the whole company in an old kit bag and head on down the road. Moreover, as the company grew, so did our outputs which meant greater demands on our resources (financial and human) and we had to accept that we needed to start choosing our engagements carefully, strategically, and with respect to the people leading, supporting, and participating in them.
The 2012 National Arts Festival is one such time. We recently played the Main Festival programme with Benchmarks and have a major project in the pipeline for our next NAF appearance. We just realised that forcing it to happen this year would actually be a disservice to the whole event, that it could definitely benefit from more time and planning. So as much as we will miss you, we hope you will miss us too! But we believe that this is only going to make us all happier in the long run. As for what the project is? Heh…you’ll just have to wait and see. But it’s awesome. So, keep ‘em peeled for 2013 NAF…that’s all we gonna tell you right now..
But hang on: does this mean that we are not going to be onstage until then?? *gasp* Don’t be ridiculous! We’ve decided to team up once more with the fabulous Baxter Theatre to present our newest work OfficeBLOCK from the 10th – 21st July in the Golden Arrow Studio Theatre. The work hasn’t been seen in the Western Cape since it was reworked in 2012 for its National Tour so it’s not to be missed, okes. Mark these dates down now, but details will follow soon-soon…
FTH:K 