TESSA DOOMS | Artists have a role to play in healing soul of the nation

South Africans hearts are broken. The promise of democracy unfulfilled has left millions of people despondent and opting out of project SA en masse.

Too many people describe their experience of post-apartheid SA as trauma. The trauma of a violent society and a violent system that instead of reducing the burdens of poverty and inequality, has entrenched them further with no clear end in sight. Fixing the country is not limited to fixing failing bureaucracies or changing leaders, SA needs a politics that heals and the arts has a role to play in delivering a mode for healing the soul of the nation today, as it has many times before.

The arts have played an important role in SA’s political history. From collective songs like Senzeni na that became the soundtrack to political funerals during the liberation Struggle or movies like Sarafina! that dramatised the Struggle and echoed hopes that freedom was truly in reach, artists in all genres have contributed to politics, shared expressions of the soul of the nation at our worst and best.

When Mme Miriam Makeba and Ntate Hugh Masekela found themselves in exile, they became tellers of the stories of oppression and struggle during apartheid. When the regime successfully censored black voices and made invisible black pain, it was artists abroad and in the country who used song and literature to alert the world to the injustices of the system and rally all behind a common cause of freedom for all in SA.

This intentional contribution of the arts to our politics continued into the early post-apartheid era. Arts activist Esther Padi, the director of Innovating Kasi Organisation, describes the advent of kwaito in the early '90s as a distinctly political act. Padi often reflects on how kwaito emerged from the township street-bash culture, an expression of our freedom through the reclamation of public space by black bodies.

Similarly, Mme Letta Mbulu in the '90s reflected on the slow rate of change with her song Not yet Uhuru, in an attempt to remind us that the work of ending apartheid as a lived experience was not yet done, and real change was yet to be realised.

Unfortunately, the role of the arts in SA politics is being slowly eroded. The business models for the creative industry discourage and at times penalise artists who have a political message. Restaurants and performance venues are reluctant to host and support overtly political artists. Political parties have reduced art performances at their events to light entertainment at the end, as a reward for people’s attendance rather than encouraging artists to use their platforms to conscientise and inspire.

Not only are we witnessing the neglect of the creative sector as a viable form of economic activity, we have lost the value of the arts as a form of political expression; a rallying cry to unlock people’s power and connect our hearts and minds.

Political think tank Rivonia Circle, through its work at the intersection of #ArtsandActvism, is reigniting the role of the arts in the co-creation of a better country: South Africa 2.0. Through programmes like Political Theatre, Rivonia Circle is investing into the skills and aspirations of a network of over 500 artist who are finding their political voices once more. This work is part of a growing movement of artists who are responding to a calling to return to being the soundtrack to our political work.

America singer and civil rights activist Nina Simone said of the arts that “the role of the artist is to reflect the times”. In contemporary SA perhaps the role of artists is to project the times. Projecting into society is not limited to telling the story of what SA is today, but projecting into our collective consciousness a picture of what SA could be tomorrow. Artists can inspire hope, provide new and common language and introduce ideas that remind us of our power to act.

In a country where morale is low and political education is waning, artists can ignite our political sensibilities. Providing words and platforms for collective contemplation of the present and future. The arts are a vehicle for coordinating thought and action across language, class and geographic barriers. To support the political voices of performers, visual artists and content creators, is to support the making of a new narrative of change that unleashes innovation and transforms SA from the inside out.

The depths of our crisis and our despair is a window of opportunity to draw on our rich heritage of political activism through the arts and leverage creativity, one of SA’s greatest human assets for public good. We all have a role to play if SA is to rise from our current depths to new and revolutionary heights.