Connecting nature, spirituality and a certain degree of uncertainty

Long before the dance explosion, where the entire world and their grandmother are adept at the latest dance craze, there was a poster at Wits University offering a dance class for amateurs at the Braamfontein recreation centre.

At that stage, I was an amateur at almost everything and I loved to dance, so I signed up. For a girl who had three points of reference — ballet, Greek traditional dancing and the club — the class was a revelation.

The dance teacher’s fluid grace, sheer athleticism and remarkable ability to communicate entire worlds of meaning through the subtlest of physical movements was riveting. It also felt entirely South African. For a moment, I believed this mobile poetry was something I too could unlock in my own, all-too-human body.

I returned week after week for the magic, until one tragic day the wonderful Vincent Sekwati Mantsoe was spirited away to the great stages of the world. His career had exploded and this sweet Braamfontein community endeavour had to fall away for me.

I don’t imagine he remembers those classes, but when I discover that he is in Johannesburg for a special performance of his solo project Desert Poems at UJ as part of their 20-year anniversary celebrations, I leap at the chance to discover him again.

I confess that much as I wanted to offer Vincent lunch, I failed. Between his whirlwind visit, the rehearsals for the performances on March 11 and 12, and my own schedule, we squeeze in an interview without the customary sustenance. Besides, what I really desire is not to break bread with him but the chance to participate in his masterclass at the Vuyani Dance Theatre, the company founded by that other great light of South African contemporary dance, Gregory Maqoma.

It’s obviously an impossible dream, given he abandoned me and my classmates at the beginning of our dance careers, and has been sharing his vast talent — both as a dancer and choreographer — at universities and dance companies around the world. He also owns Association Company Noa, formed in 2005 in Paris, where he lives these days. 

Vincent and Gregory grew up together in Soweto. As luck would have it, the football- playing school friends saw a version of the same poster that piqued my interest. Sylvia Glasser’s company, Moving into Dance Mophatong, was offering classes to the Soweto youth. The decision to join up radically altered their lives.

“At that time, things were different,” Vincent says. “My father could not imagine his son dancing. There were only two paths for young boys then — football or medicine.” 

I believe a guiding force has led me to this point, preceding 'Desert Poems' and other solo pieces

In the event, there was a third path, which led to a scholarship with Sylvia Glasser as his lifelong mentor — and a globally fêted and celebrated career.

“I dropped out of matric and followed my passion for dance. When we started, we did not know anything about contemporary dance, but I had grown up in a home of sangomas.”

It was this essential connection to his own culture and spiritual traditions that forged his approach to dance. His mother, grandmother and two aunts were sangomas and he grew up watching and participating in the ritual drumming and dancing aspects of their work.

We discuss the almost magical power of dance to communicate deep and essential truths that transcend language. Vincent’s rootedness in his culture — the influences of Sepedi, Sesotho, isiNdebele and isiXhosa cultural practice — undergirds and inspires his work, while building on the framework of contemporary dance practices from across the planet.

But it is the ability of dance to connect us to a higher realm and to nature through this universal language that is most evident in the themes he explores through his work. 

The choreography of Desert Poems, with additional music by the Dizu Plaatjies Ibuyanmo Ensemble, channels the “austere allure and enigmatic tranquillity of an environment characterised by extremes”.

Vincent explains that he is drawn to the desert as a metaphor, and tries to express the extremes in the environment — the elements of sun, wind, empty space, the vast silence of night and the “remarkable tenacity of life”.

“These poems resonate with themes of resilience, adaptation and the indomitable spirit of survival amid formidable challenges. It’s harsh but beautiful and speaks to this moment in time.

“I ... find myself exploring uncharted territory. I believe a guiding force has led me to this point, preceding Desert Poems and other solo pieces, which uniquely connects nature, spirituality and a certain degree of uncertainty.”

Ultimately he feels that dance connects him to his ancestors.

“The unseen forces that guide my spiritual journey — without them this work would not have been possible.”