AS THE WORLD continues to celebratethis month, KomezArt, a virtual art space and e-commerce platform established by Rwandan social enterprise ‘Kurema Kureba Kwiga’, is seeking to highlight young women in the Rwandan creative sector by hosting its very first privately-recorded, live-streamed, and interactive concert slated for Wednesday, March 24. Through the online concert, KomezArt is collaborating with local clothing line Haute Baso, and the British Council’s East Africa Arts program to spotlight Rwandas women artists and to honor women’s creativity in a unique way. Dubbed “SheKomeza”, the event will feature performances by female artistes Kaya Byinshii, Angell Mutoni, Ariel Wayz, and Mike Kayihura, the lone male performer, with an additional surprise guest and unique live performance. To top it all off, the event will be hosted by CNBC Africa’s presenter and producer Zwena Bachoo live at Haute Baso’s complex. According to Judith Kaine, the brains behind KomezArt, the events goal is to provide insights into how Rwandas artists and art consumers can promote women artists work and foster equity in the arts. “As our main goal remains to push the art forward and share art with more people, we wanted to do something to celebrate female creativity and the power of women in the creative sector and we believe that the creative industry is an ecosystem. We want to contribute to the development of the whole ecosystem of arts,” Kaine told The New Times in an interview on Monday, March 22. Under this year’s theme of the International Womens Day 2021, “Choose To Challenge”, KomezArt targets to draw inspiration from the theme by bringing together various artists to explore issues around gender inclusivity in Rwandas arts sector during the pandemic and beyond. Kaine is the founder and Creative Director of ‘Kurema, Kureba, Kwiga’, a public-art project that uses visual and street arts to highlight social issues in Rwanda, bringing together contemporary Rwandan artists and community-stake-holders. While she claims that Rwanda’s creative industry still counts gaps in women inclusiveness, Kaine said that the event will be more about the performances as interactions will be exchanged among the participants to appeal the increase in the presence of women in the creative industry as well as support gender balance in the creative ecosystem. The event will safely gather the artists to perform and share their perspectives and thoughts on how to create a more gender-inclusive creative industry. “We want to see how we can challenge the creative industry to be more gender equal and inclusive and how to increase the presence of women’s creativity in the East African creative economy,” she said. KomezArt was initiated in September 2020 with a vision to “Push African Art Forward.” The visual arts-focused organisation believes that the creative industries ecosystem should be elevated through multifaceted dimensions, and will therefore bring together visual arts, musical and performing arts, poetry, fashion and design to create something unique and special that draws attention to women’s creativity. Kaine is convinced that the artists have incorporated various techniques and skills to stay creative and productive over the past year, despite the unprecedented impacts of the COVID-19 pandemic on the Rwandan creative sector. The live stream will be accessible from 6pm on both KomezArt and Haute Basos Instagram and facebook pages.
