BWAGAMOYO AFRICULTURE is a non-governmental organization registered with Tanzania Arts Council since 2015. In 2005 a group of dancers, drummers, and performers who trained at TAASISI YA SANAA NA UTAMADUNI BAGAMOYO (TaSUBa) began working to establish a professional performance group that would travel, conduct cultural research, share, and promote traditional and contemporary arts. Through collaborations and partnerships this group has been able to support and develop the professional performance practices of its 30+ membership. This serves as a positive and consistent stream of income for locals who have studied performing arts. Africulture invests in the local and national arts community through community engagement and instruction as well as performance contracts with governmental and large corporate agencies. Africulture instructors teach African traditional dance, acrobatics, theater, drama and drumming.
Africulture has performed internationally since 2012 with Alliance Francie (Kenya), Bagamoyo International Festival (Tanzania), Zanzibar Film Festival (Zanzibar), Haba na Haba International Contemporary Dance (Tanzania), Green Peace festival (Tanzania), Kendwa Rocks Full Moon Party (Zanzibar), Dusud festival (France and Spain), Tyrolen Festival (Sweden), Surajkund Festival
(India).
T.R.A.P started working with Africulture in 2022 providing preservation support, grant-writing, and other community engagement support. With an award from The International Association of Blacks in Dance, we were able to produce the 2023 week-long Performance and Preservation Festival with free dance, drumming, and drama workshops, a dance initiative with Ballethnic Dance Company, as well as, archiving and memory work gatherings.
Bwagamoyo Africulture
Africulture Leadership
Curthbeth j. Ngwenuke
Curthbeth j. Ngwenuke is a co-founder and the current Director of Bwagamoyo Africulture. Established in 2005, Africulture has remained committed to promoting traditional arts as a strategy towards professional and personal development in local communities.
While Ngwenuke was born at home in a small community, called Pera Village, he has spent most of his days between the Capital city of Dar es Salaam, and the historic town, Bagamoyo in Tanzania. As a local to the community he serves, Ngwenuke is particularly sensitive to how history has shaped the environment around him and the influences globalization and tourism has had on the youth and the culture. Therefore, his work at Africulture aims to preserve the values important to his community through practicing, documenting, and sharing cultural traditions.
As a multi-disciplinary artist himself, Curthbeth Ngwenuke encourages explorations into different creative practices through formal education, hands-on learning, travel, and artist apprenticeships. From 2017 to 2019, Ngwenuke traveled to Sweden and Germany to participate in arts workshops. This experience inspired his pursuit into digital arts and in 2020 studied media production at the Africa Digital Media Institute (ADMI) in Kenya. Today, Ngwenuke’s background and current practice in digital technology helps support the documentation activities central to the cultural preservation initiative of Bwagamoyo Africulture.
Niclata "Happiness" Justine Ngwena
Happiness Justine Ngwena is a co-founder and the Assistant Secretary of Africulture, since 2013 helping the next generation of artists who lack the opportunity to nurture their own creative talents. With a certificate of performing arts and visual arts at Bagamoyo college of arts, Happiness uses that experience to develop her own craft and share her expertise with the artists surrounding her.
Ibrahim Mrisho Kibwana
Ibrahim Mrisho kibwana wears many hats as the chairman, dancer, choreographer, and a co-founder at Africulture. Built off the vision of self employment through the arts, he has helped maintain the comradeship amongst the group by helping them reach their goals. Similar to his peers, he enjoys the fruits of his labor by continuing his work as an art teacher and broadening the realm of possibility for other young artists.
Mohamed Maeda
Mohamed Haji Maeda the manager of Africulture. He is the Barchelor Degree holder of Fine Arts and Design in Dodoma. Mohamed is a professional Graphics designer, as well as, Drummer, Dancer, and Actor. Currently, he is working as freelancer and teacher of Arts and Designing. Mohamed is a painter who can paint different kinds of paintings which are Realistic, Abstract and creative one’s.
Gallery
