The Artist as Activist project in Zambia invited partners, artists and communities in one of the poorest neighbourhoods in Lusaka to explore what structures, stories and performances can be built, designed, played and imagined with Zambian grown bamboo and recycled plastic waste.
4 months of creative research by performers at Circus Zambia, a grassroots circus project, and staff at ZUKANI Action Zambia, a plastic waste collecting social enterprise, in collaboration with Imagine Bamboo Creative Director Orit Azaz and Nofit State Circus, resulted in prototyping of shelters, seating, musical instruments, baskets and structures to facilitate high skill circus. New circus, dance and music performances were created and premiered at a daylong outdoor community festival attended by 1000s of local people. The event was called Itchi N'Chatu which means 'This is Ours'.
The project drew in other local partners including an agricultural outreach project that currently uses wood for biofuel but wants to reduce its carbon footprint. The company has invested in a long term bamboo planting and education project of impressive scale. After initial research to identify the most appropriate bamboo species for Zambian environmental conditions and biofuel purpose, its focus is now on bambusa balcooa. Plants have been procured from Bambu Nusa Verde lab in Indonesia and are being nurtured in Lusaka before being distributed to 12,000 farms across Zambia, alongside a programme to educate farmers about how to grow and care for bamboo on their land.
500 baby bamboo plants were offered to the Artist as Activist project to distribute to local community organisations and residents. In turn, this attracted support from local councillors, keen to be seen to contribute to improving the local environment and cleaning up illegal dump sites, and attention from local and national media.
The Artist as Activist project has had a big impact in Zambia, where plastic waste is a huge problem and bamboo is considered of little interest or value. The project has raised awareness of bamboo as an important sustainable material for construction and design that can also make significant improvements to the environment. Partners are planning a Bamboo Association to support continued bamboo development in the country.
