Festival Belluard Bollwerk International

Baqamile is a compilation of rites of passage, a ceremony rooted in South African spiritual beliefs. Video, song and dance combine, creating a dialogue between parallel worlds in this immersive experience.

The audience enters a dark room. They are greeted by three musicians in a soundscape of constantly modulating tones and voices. Every performer represents a transition of time, an evolving celestial body and a specific movement. A video of an imagined dreamscape evokes rituals and rites of passage. Baqamile means “the shining ones”. In South African spiritual beliefs, stars, ancestors and the underworldly are one and the same. Thus parallel worlds communicate through the body of the performer.

>> Want to know more? Read the interview with Buhlebezwe Siwani