Boyzie Cekwana
Boyzie Cekwana was born in 1970 in Soweto, South Africa, where he began his career as a dancer. At age 19, he joined Adel Blank's company. Four years later, he was spotted by the artistic director of the Playhouse Dance Company, who hired him as a dancer, but also as choreographer-in-residence. In 1995, he created Brother, Brother, which was awarded a prize at the Third International Ballet and Choreography Competition in Helsinki, Finland. Two years later, he created African Odyssée, produced with help from the Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts. That same year, he founded his own company, Floating Outfit Project, based in Durban. In 1999, he was awarded first prize at the third Biennale des rencontres chorégraphiques africaines et de l'Océan Indien in Antananarivo, in Madagascar. Over the past 20 years, this artist who has always seen art and political engagement as going hand in hand and is regularly invited throughout the world, has become a key actor in the creation of a regional artistic network in Southern Africa, and has created a body of work at once lucid, political, and critical. Many of his works are now part of the repertoire of prestigious companies like the Ballet de Lorraine, the Scottish Dance Theatre, or the Washington Ballet.
