Infecting The City 2010 produced a performance art festival that was loosely themed around the concept of Human Rite. The theme invited artists to create public artworks that investigated and explored the role of rites and rituals as tools for transformation and healing. The artworks questioned “How do the arts use ritual to effect social change and cohesion?”, “What are the wounds in our society and our city that need attention?”, “Can we make art works that are themselves rituals to heal these wounds?” and “What shape can rituals take in the communal spaces of the 21st-century Global Village?”
Taking over the streets from 13 to 20 February 2010, ITC encompassed collaborative performance works, art installations, choreographed pieces and public interventions. The works were created by top local and international artists, and were staged free to the public in the communal spaces of the Cape Town CBD.
The New Collaborations were a focus feature of Infecting The City 2010, where seven artists from South Africa, other African states and non-African countries participated in creating two new large-scale site-specific performance works. Their residency began in mid-November 2009 and included an intensive three-week course of presentations, experiences and site visits. The course aimed to equip the participants with a deep sense of the issues at play beneath the skin of Cape Town, observed through the magnifying lens of the 2010 festival theme.
