IFA

       IFA is an isi’Zulu word for inheritance, legacy or that which is hereditary, the Yoruba word for a divination system and concept of consciousness.

The project is initiated largely on the basis of need – and want – to find better ways of working with art and the land, and for a community of

    practice engaged in these questions. We have been working on the community garden and a series of other land related projects under other 

auspices for some years now and are drawn to the questions of what art should do in society, but also what a turn to the land might mean

   beyond the political platitudes. In addition, the extended challenges facing South Africa and the arts scene more broadly seem to call for new 

strategies for how our practices might live outside of the inherited colonial forms of funding and arts infrastructure that have precariously

‘sustained’ practice here over the past years. We are searching, therefore, for alternatives and looking to search alongside others.

IFA was a 1 year research encounter where three projects came together to explore these questions of community rootedness, sustained

and collective interest in territory as a site and influence of artistic practices.

The results of our research are share on our instagram archive, and are in process to be shared in other ways.

ABOUT THE THREE PROJECTS

Traci Kwaai leads Sites of Rememberance is a sixth-generation fisher child of the indigenous fishing community of Kalk Bay.She is a storyteller, activist, teacher and entrepreneur who leads the powerful and impactful “Walk of Remembrance” focusing on the history and marginalisation of her community who have lived in Kalk Bay for more than 300 years.

Sibusile Xaba and a group of creatives are in the early phases of establishing a communal space of, Kwantokozo Community, in Utrecht, Kwa-Zulu Natal. Sibusile has felt the need to see or create new better living communities, and environments, after three decades of being a performing artist and travelling widely.

The ungovernable has been engaging with land working projects and its own attempts at a community garden since 2021. The community garden, in particular, has been an ongoing attempt at creating a land-working-based centre for community engagement, artistic programming, and peer education on land issues, food and indigenous knowledge systems.