Tanatsei Gambura is a multidisciplinary artist and poet. She created a platform for herself on theatrical stages in her home country Zimbabwe and South Africa where she was a student at African Leadership Academy. Currently a student at the University of Edinburgh in Scotland, United Kingdom, under the Mastercard Foundation Scholars Program.
Biography edit
Tanatsei was the oldest of five children and raised in Harare,Zimbabwe . Tanatsei's family had enormous difficulties when she turned 14, making school costly and requiring Tanatsei to take a year out from school.
Tanatsei used her energies at this time to create a network of friends who shared her interests. A lifetime passion in the arts also began to emerge as she looked for ways to become more involved in her community. Tanatsei was highly involved in theatre and the arts when she went back to school at the age of 15, to the point where the British Council chose her work for the photography and poetry residency. Tanatsei was nominated for a prestigious scholarship when she was 17 to attend the African Leadership Academy in Johannesburg, where she successfully finished their two-year programme. Before moving to South Africa. Tanatsei is the runner-up to the inaugural Amsterdam Open Book Prize (2020), a Rebecca Swift Foundation Women Poets’ Prize longlistee (2020), and a recipient of the Library Of Africa and The African Diaspora (LOATAD) and Savannah Center for Contemporary Art (SCCA) Writing Residency (2021). Her poems appeared in Prufrock Magazine, London Reader, New Coin Poetry Journal, Poetry London and others. She is an alumnus of the British Council residency.
Tanatsei founded the 25 May Movement, a collective of artists, community organisers, social workers and cultural producers collaborating to lead social change in Africa
25 May Movement edit
Tanatsei and her peers started the 25 May Movement (named after Africa Day) as a result of her growing anger with the developmental obstacles plaguing the African continent. The goal was to create a thriving, forward-thinking, and sustainable creative economy that supports Africa's growth. A bold and accurate statement made by the Movement is that "communities around the world have cultural practises and means for creative expression - tools to navigate life." In light of this, it is appropriate to employ these cultural practises to forge a society's tolerance, cohesion, and ethical intentionality.
The movement, which began simply with what Tanatsei had—her poetic prowess, a camera, and a group of friends—has evolved into a collective that runs a national broadcasting series in Zimbabwe, facilitates seminal workshops, publishes short films, and collaborates with twenty-four beneficiaries to give children under the age of fourteen access to empowering programmes without charge. Organisations like United Nations Women and the Swedish Embassy in Zimbabwe have both taken notice of the movement's work. As a recognition of her achievement with the 25 May Movement, she was awarded with the Diana Award in 2019. The Diana Award aims to honour some of the world's and the UK's most inspirational young people. The organisation searches for "exceptional young people who have demonstrated their ability to inspire and mobilise new generations to serve their communities and create long-lasting change on a global scale." The honour is described as the most highest recognition for social action that a young person between the ages of 9 and 25 may earn.
Poetry edit
- Sari
- Cause of Death
- Woman
- To Those Who Storms Are Fond Of
- Death And Dreaming in My Language
- Things I Have Forgotten Before