Ntsikelelo "Boyzie" CEKWANA (ZA)

Originally from Soweto, Boyzie grew up in the townships of Johannesburg, South Africa. He began his dance training with Carly Dibakoane in Meadowlands. As a “would-be collaborator,” he worked mostly with artists from South Africa, Mozambique and Madagascar, as well as with American-Belgian artist Davis Freeman, musician Madala Kunene, French light designer Eric Wurtz, and Canadians Guglielmo Bernardi and Melanie Demers. Boyzie’s numerous awards include the Standard Bank Young Artist Award and the FNBVITA Young Choreographers Grant. He won the Third International Ballet and Choreography Competition in Helsinki. In 1997 und 1998, he was recipient of a danceWEB grant. In 1997, he founded The Floating Outfit Project (FOP) artists’ collective. His works have been performed at Theatre de la Ville, Paris, Festival ImpulsTanz in Vienna, the Montpellier International Festival de Danse and the Lyon Biennale. As a teacher and workshop leader, he has been invited to Brest, Vienna, Glasgow, Lisbon, Maputo, Nancy and Nairobi, as well as to South African educational institutions including the University of Cape Town and Pretoria Technikon. He is artistic director of the Jomba! Contemporary Dance Festival in Durban, South Africa. At present, he is working together with artists from Mozambique, Madagascar, La Réunion and Zimbabwe to set up a regional South African collective.