TOP Bulawayo arts outfit, Iyasa, has left the country for Austria for their annual international tour and cultural exchange programme with a new dance piece, African Thunder, which they are set to showcase.

The nine-member group led by director, Nkululeko Dube, left via South Africa and will head for Austria on Friday. Their return is scheduled for August.

Dube told that the group had a programme they were running with a theatre company called Theatro Piccolo.

"We will also work on another promotion with a company called Szene Waldviertel Austria. We will run in Austria for two months before we shift to Czech Republic for another programme. We will also be working with some other countries like Germany, Italy and Slovakia in the middle of the whole programme," he said.

He said their return in August will be for a short while before going back to Austria for another programme which will run from September and October.




Dube said some of their members will leave for Germany in May on an on-going programme that began last year with Theatre Strahl of Berlin.

"We have different productions like what we are doing now. We are at a stage where most of our productions are called co-productions. Like every year, we either have two or three new plays that we do in collaboration with our partners in Europe," he said.

He said this year they had two new productions - Radio Freedom, a co-production with Theatre Ansichit of Vienna, and Mr K Roko Goes for a Swim, which was done with Theatro Piccolo.



IYASA Austria Arts
Source: NewsDay