“Your roots are your resumé and your creativity is your currency.”
This is the overarching message set to be conveyed at the Raymond Mhlaba Sports Centre in Motherwell on Friday when Zivumele Creative Roots Hub hosts its inaugural Heritage and Creatives Expo.
The nonprofit company is dedicated to nurturing youth creativity, and at Friday’s event pupils from several Motherwell schools will be exposed to careers in the arts sector.
Founder Andiswa Manyati said while the hub regularly hosted school engagement sessions, skill-building workshops and community events throughout the Eastern Cape, the expo would be a first for the NPC.
“The whole aim of the expo is to educate children that there is a career element within creativity,” she said.
“Whether you love music or film, like me, or you are into drama — we also have gaming … there is a career element to it in terms of coding and innovation.
“Traditional dancing is also an element of creativity within our heritage.
“Heritage is important because it is important for our children to know where they come from”
Manyati said with the abundance of artistic talent in the province, it was important for the youth to be exposed to expos that catered to careers beyond the regular medical, accounting and engineering fields.
“I do not want to say there are not enough career expos in the locations or far outlying areas, because they are there, but I have never heard of an expo that just focused on creativity.
“Pupils are used to being exposed to being a doctor, lawyer, they do not know there is a career in being a journalist, a musician, or a writer, the unfortunate part is that even the subjects in schools are not there.
“Since the education department was not doing anything about that, I felt us as creatives, we had that burden.
“I wish someone would have told 13-year-old me there was a Stageworld [Theatre School], which is why I ended up doing journalism,” Manyati said.
She said she had started preparing for the expo in March and eleven schools had confirmed their attendance for the event so far.
“Creatives that are from Motherwell, they want to see this work, they want to assist the children, despite the current challenges we are facing.
“However, I also felt the most important role players that were needed were there — we have the artists and we have the kids.”
Manyati said she planned to take the expo to different communities in Nelson Mandela Bay, and then throughout the Eastern Cape.
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