Kuda Mapeza
YUKYUH
Let's Take Over - Saturday March 5 | Northcote Town Hall Arts Centre
BOOK HERE
YUKYUH is a performance piece that dances on the crossroads between distaste and curiosity. It invites participants to find sanctuary in the uncomfortable. What is more powerful than our ability to connect with similarity is our ability to remain curious and empathetic towards each other's differences?
Artist Bio: If we took off all our skin and hugged, would we run hot or cold? Sweet thing, do you want to find out? The spell of looser limbs and high roller roams lively in the south of your skull and you've been invited to arrive and shine and have every living thing greet you to kiss your toenails. To find themselves in you. This is where our confluence resides. We should dare to rejoice in such synergy. Your scream lives in my throat, I burrow and curl my body in the soft of your tongue. The salt of your saliva cleans my eyes and the trickle of my blood pulls you back to me. I love it here. Take off your shoes. Welcome home.
Making waves in Brisbane, Sydney and Melbourne alike, Kuda Mapeza's multidisciplinary artistry continues to grow. The limit does not exist for a singer/songwriter, musician, performer, actor and storyteller of her curiosity. From acquiring Bell Shakespeare's John Bell Scholarship in 2017 to concocting musical accompaniment for Shake & Stir Theatre Co's Macbeth to acting in multiple roles in Harry Potter and the Cursed Child, this is only the beginning for the young and fervent artist.
Why did you apply for Let's Take Over?
I applied for Let's Take Over because I wanted to know what it took, both creatively and practically, to see a creative vision come to fruition and be consumed by an audience. I also wanted to gain a better understanding about how an idea becomes an event. I think power and autonomy is handed to artists and passed around communities when those who are coming up know how to facilitate their own words and the works of others. It feels like the sharing of that knowledge is wholly empowering, not only to an individual but also to those they are able to help.
What have you learnt from Let's Take Over?
I've learnt that you can't (and shouldn't) do it on your own. And that people want to see and feel something that moves them. If something inside you in being asked to be made, you should make it!
What is one thing you are excited about for the event?
I'm excited to feel people feeling our work. A lot of our chats have taken place over Zoom, so to think that real-life people will be in the building? That's hectic!