Penelope Thloloe waves her hand towards the tightly packed houses and congested streets of Johannesburg’s Alexandra township. This is where the 24-year-old grew up, and this is where, somewhat incongruously, she sees the future of her profession.
”Some people put down Alex and say that nothing here is good enough,” said Ms Thloloe, an accomplished ballerina and qualified ballet instructor. ”But I love it. This is where I want to teach.”
In the world of dance, one of South Africa’s toughest townships may seem an unpromising place to start an academy for classical ballet. But hundreds of black children have been auditioning for the programme, part of an emerging generation that is taking the country’s arts into a new post-apartheid era.
For generations, dance and music had been the preserve of the white and the privileged, but the genres are now being injected with new energy and inspiration, thanks to the enthusiasm and participation of black children.
”I want to show these township kids that we can do everything to the highest level,” says Thloloe.
As the Ballet Theatre Afrikan’s director of satellite projects, she already teaches dance in Soweto and Ennerdale townships, but the Alexandra academy is the first to take young students with plans to train them in a professional way. It has a strict and rigorous regime of tuition — four afternoons a week for 10 years.
”I want to give them the discipline and structure that is needed in ballet. That will help them in all aspects of life,” she says.
For weeks she has been auditioning children, aged eight to 11, from Alexandra’s 11 primary schools. From the more than 1 000 who try out she has to select 32.
The large cement-floored hall at East Bank community centre is clean but bare.
Thloloe shows where a piano will be placed in the coming weeks and where a wooden floor will be installed.
In front of her, about 30 children have gathered, giggling with anticipation. They do handstands and chase each other, but fall silent when Thloloe strides up to begin the exercises. She evaluates the children’s stance and flexibility as they stretch their legs and point their feet. Later they skip across the hall as she snaps the beat, watched by a few parents.
”There is a vibrant, positive transformation taking place,” says Nick Ishmael-Perkins, a Barbadian writer and producer working in South Africa. ”Just a few years ago I went to a production of Aida here and white singers were wearing black make-up on their faces. I thought, something is wrong in the new South Africa. But now things are opening up.”
South African cellist Kutlwano Masote, the first black member of the National Symphony Orchestra, agrees. ”Black South Africans want to be part of a new culture. Young people see the opportunities,” he says. ”It takes years to train a musician to play in an orchestra. I see young people starting that work.
”We are laying the foundation for the participation of many blacks and that can invigorate the arts. There will be crossovers and marriages between classical and African arts. South Africa can become the cutting edge of cross-cultural art.”
Thloloe sees similar prospects in ballet. ”I studied at the Ballet Rambert in London, which was great. But it was when I came back here that I felt that spark. Africans have their own style of ballet. It is rigorous, disciplined and demanding, but it is still African. We have a different energy. If it is harnessed from a young age, we can make dance history.” – Guardian Unlimited Â