YEBO ART GALLERY LAUNCHES WEBSITE TO PROMOTE ARTISTS
MBABANE – Hardly days after assisting artists with a E45 000 fund, Yebo Art Gallery has launched a new website.
The new site according to Yebo Art Gallery Director, Aleta Armstrong is aimed at promoting the local creative industry’s craft. It was designed by Mzwa Shongwe from Caracali Consulting. Armstrong further added that the previous website had to be updated hence the need to make a new website that would provide information on the Gallery’s developments and promote local artists. “As Yebo Art Gallery, we had to upgrade the previous website into the new one and we added pages for different upcoming projects,” she said. Fresh from assisting artists with E3 000 incentives each last week, Armstrong said this was necessitated by the fact that most artists were dealt a huge blow ever since the pandemic caused a total shutdown of the Arts industry.
edition
The first edition of the Fund was sponsored by the Sahee Foundation, who have long been involved in grassroots sustainable development work in Eswatini. As a result, a total of 15 creatives were awarded grants of E3 000 each (for a total project cost of E45 000) in recognition of their impacted livelihoods, sustained creative output and dedication to the arts in Eswatini. An award of two art material hampers (valued at E500 each) was also provided for ‘up-and-coming artists’- Thabo Sibeko and Skhumbuzo Matimela. An independent jury of five local artists was formed to create an efficient, transparent, diverse and democratic process of selecting the Fund recipients. The final winners were selected by the jury members based on merit, diversity and impact.
Fund winners represent a wide variety of disciplines such as music, dance, fashion, fine art, film and theater. Based on the website, the Jury members were Sizo Hlophe (Antidote Music), Aleta Armstrong (Yebo! Art Gallery), Khulekani Msweli (JEREMPAUL), Single-Lilly Ndwandwe (Writer) and Mbongeni Dlamini (Visual Artist) and web design was by Caracali Consulting and Paul Chasusa. Armstrong further stated that this wouldn’t have been possible without a collaborative effort from Yebo Art Gallery as she acknowledged the organiser of the fund Dane Mathendele Armstrong.
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