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SFIAF – West Oakland to West Africa
May 4 @ 11:00 am - 1:00 pm
Early Bird tickets are available on the festival website. It is advised to purchase advance tickets for this event. If tickets sell out online, tickets will not be available at the door.
West Oakland to West Africa
Lake Walking, Revolutionary Talking (2024, Preview)
Lake Walking, Revolutionary Talking is an interactive, experimental performance including a live and virtual cast of spoken word artists from Kenya, Ghana, Nigeria, and the U.S. Set in Oakland’s Lake Merritt, lost children of the African diaspora wander in an imaginary desert in hopes of discovering untainted water that will cleanse their spirit. This journey through space and time celebrates the power of imagination and connection. Featuring Ayodele Nzinga, Karla Brundage, Duana Fullwiley, David Odiase, Sir Black, Rameses Setekh, Kevin Dublin, Wanda Sabir, Gemini, Amos White, Godfrey-Elvis Odianose, Zakiyyah G.E. Capehart, Joey Korgan, Loice Mwita.
Featuring:
Artistic Director: Karla Brundage
Playwright: Allison Francis
Video Design: Kevin Lo
Co-Producer: Kevin Dublin
Actors
Majick: Ayodele Nzinga
Sand to Water: Duana Fullwiley
Conductor: Rameses Setekh
Poet: Zakiyyah G.E. Capehard
Saturday, May 4th, 2024
Time: Doors & Brunch 11:00 am, Performance 11:30 am
Admission: Early Bird: $20 / Advance: $25 / Door: $28 (Brunch included with ticket purchase)
ABOUT THE ARTISTS:
West Oakland to West Africa
In 2013, West Oakland to West Africa (WO2WA) originated when Karla Brundage taught English in Abidjan, Cote D’Ivoire, inspired by Ghana’s spoken word scene. Partnering with Ehalakasa, the Ghanaian initiative aimed at a poetic exchange, it draws from griot tradition and hip-hop to educate youth on their African heritage. Launched in 2016 with support from the Mills College Community Engagement Fellowship, WO2WA made a profound impact. The 2018 publication, “Our Spirits Carry Our Voices,” led the poets to Ghana for a slam. Since then, WO2WA conducted exchanges in Kenya and Nigeria, featuring over 100 pan-African poets.
https://westoaklandtowestafrica.com
https://www.facebook.com/WO2WA/
Karla Brundage
Karla Brundage is a Bay Area-based poet, activist, and educator with a passion for social justice. She believes that in order to restore balance and reclaim our humanity as Black people, racist structures that uphold this belief, must be dismantled. Her writing is primarily for Black women and people disenfranchised by poverty, abuse, neglect, or violence. She is the founder of West Oakland to West Africa.
Ayodela Nzinga (Majick)
Nzinga, MFA, PhD is an author, director, producer, thespian, dramaturge, member of Alameda County Women’s Hall of Fame, and the inaugural Poet Laureate of Oakland. Ayodele is the Lead Curator of BAM House Black Cultural Center in Oakland; founding director of the Lower Bottom Playaz; founding director of the Black Arts Movement Business District, Community Development Corporation of Oakland; producer of BAMBDFEST International; a YBCA Creative Corps Fellow; and a California Arts Council Legacy Fellow. Ayodele is the author of Performing Literacy, The Horse Eaters, SorrowLand Oracle, and Incandescent. Ayodele Nzinga hosts Winter in America: The SpeakEasy.
Duana Fullwiley (Sand to Water)
Duana Fullwiley is a literary anthropologist of science and medicine whose fieldwork with scientists, patients, and the larger public explores the interplay of genetics, health, and cultural politics in Senegal, France, and the United States. She is the author of The Enculturated Gene: Sickle Cell Health Politics and Biological Difference in West Africa as well as numerous articles on ancestry genetics in the United States. The larger themes of her work have also inspired her poetic engagements with medical power, scientific legacies, and the human animal’s place in nature. She has received awards from the Fulbright Scholars Program to Senegal, the National Science Foundation, the Social Science Research Council, and the Wenner-Gren Foundation for Anthropological Research. She teaches at Stanford University.
PREVIEW THE ARTISTS:
SAN FRANSISCO INTERNATIONAL ARTS FESTIVAL (SFIAF):
SFIAF celebrates the arts by bringing together a global community of artists and audiences. SFIAF presents innovative projects that focus on increasing awareness and understanding within and across cultures. Their core values are based on principles of cultural and economic equity and coordinating the shared resources of multiple organizations in order to reach mutually beneficial goals.
SFIAF presents the work of innovative artists from the Bay Area and around the world; many of the international artists make their US debut at the Festival. From 2003-23, SFIAF and more than 100 presenting partners have coordinated, presented, and/or produced performances by over 600 arts ensembles from California and 60 other countries, and presented hundreds of educational and community engagement activities with diverse communities.
In addition to working with larger institutions, SFIAF places a high priority on the participation of culturally diverse and smaller entities—in particular, communities whose histories have been marginalized or left out of the prevailing American narrative. Activating and supporting relationships between such organizations and artists is a key component of SFIAF.
Saturday, May 4th, 2024
Time: Doors & Brunch 11:00 am, Performance 11:30 am
Admission: Early Bird: $20 / Advance: $25 / Door: $28 (Brunch included with ticket purchase)
Note: A limited quantity of additional tickets will be available for purchase at the door unless otherwise noted on the Facebook event page that the show is SOLD OUT.
Purchase Early Bird tickets for this event
Note: Purchasing an advance ticket guarantees admission but does not guarantee a seat. Seating is first come, first served.
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