Future Festivals South Africa: Exploring possibilities
for the age of Covid-19
ABOUT THE PROJECT
Future Festivals South Africa: Possibilities for the Age of Covid-19 is an international collaborative project developed by King’s College London (UK) and Rhodes University (South Africa). It aims to investigate the impact of Covid-19 on arts festivals in South Africa (SA), building a new knowledge base – and a collaborative network – to enable them to survive these challenging times, and to thrive in the future. In doing so, the project is partnering with some of the country’s most important festivals and will be seeking to develop a broad and inclusive network of stakeholders. The project brings together an interdisciplinary team of researchers including cultural economists, cultural policy researchers and creative labour specialists. Data collection has been carefully designed to integrate mixed-methods and to involve a wide range of research participants including festival organisers, creative producers, and festival audiences. Qualitative interviews and focus groups will be conducted with festival organisers and creative producers. Quantitative data will be collected with festivals’ audiences, via online surveys, exploring their patterns of cultural consumption and participation (before and since the outbreak of Covid-19). Finally, a community engagement project will be undertaken – Letters, Videos and Pictures from the Future – to gather creative contributions from stakeholders on their vision of what South African festivals should be like in the years ahead. The project aims to provide an initial understanding of the how Covid-19 has affected arts festivals in South Africa, but also to enable new ideas for future: including new business models, and new approaches to audiences and participation.
The project has received ethics approval by King’s College London (MRA-19/20-21126 ). Full details of the ethical guidelines and information sheet for the project are available online.
Future Festivals South Africa: Possibilities for the Age of Covid-19 aims to investigate the impact of Covid-19 on festivals in South Africa (SA). Working in partnership with some of the country’s most important arts festivals we will build a new knowledge base, and a new network, to enable South African festivals to survive these challenging times and to thrive in the future. The project’s main objectives are:
- To understand the impact that Covid-19 is having on the working practices and activities of South African arts festivals: including any initial responses that are being developed, such as new ways of delivering cultural content (online or with social distancing), and business models that make it possible for festivals to continue.
- To develop a new network – supported by an online knowledge exchange platform – to allow festival organisers and creative producers to navigate together the uncertainties posed by Covid-19, and to be informed by up to date knowledge.
- To understand the ways in which Covid-19 is changing festival audiences’ patterns of cultural consumption and participation in SA: including whether they have participated in online festivals, and whether this has changed their perspective on the economic, social and cultural value of live and online events.
- To support a wide range of stakeholders (festival organisers, producers and audiences) to creatively develop visions of ‘future festivals’: new possibilities for South African festivals in the age of Covid-19
Research Team
The project is a collaboration between the Department of Culture, Media and Creative Industries at King’s College London (UK) and the Department of Economics at Rhodes University (South Africa)
Dr Roberta Comunian. Reader in Creative Economy at the Department of Culture, Media and Creative Industries at King’s College London. She has previously led the AHRC international research network on “UNDERSTANDING AND SUPPORTING CREATIVE ECONOMIES IN AFRICA“. Her interest include creative industries, complexity and the relationship between cultural production and space.
Prof Jen Snowball Professor of Economics at Rhodes University, South Africa. She is also the Chief Research Strategist at the South African Cultural Observatory (SACO). Her research interests in cultural economics include the impact and value of culture festivals, cultural economy mapping studies, employment in the cultural and creative industries, and international trade in cultural goods and services in emerging markets.
Dr Jonathan Gross. Lecturer in Culture, Media and Creative Industries at King’s College London. He is currently working on the EU H2020 funded project DISCE (Developing Inclusive and Sustainable Creative Economies) His research interests include cultural participation and cultural policy.
Mr Delon Tarentaal Lecturer of Economics at Rhodes University, South Africa. He specialises in Mathematical Economics and Quantitative Finance. His research interests include automation of portfolio management via recurrent and artificial neural networks as well as cultural economics focusing on the video gaming industry.
Ms. Fiona Drummond PhD candidate in economics at Rhodes University. Her interdisciplinary research applies geographic methods to study creative economies.
KEY RESEARCH OUTPUTS
Comunian, R., Drummond , F., Gross, J., Snowball, J., & Tarentaal, D. (2023). Future Festivals South Africa: Lessons from the Age of Covid-19, A policy report. King’s College London. https://doi.org/10.18742/pub01-096
Snowball, J., Tarentaal, D., Drummond, F., Comunian, R., & Gross, J. (2023). Online festival experiences, eventscapes and cultural value: insights on the dilemmas faced by two South African festivals during COVID-19. Annals of Leisure Research, 28(2), 167-190. Advance online publication. https://doi.org/10.1080/11745398.2023.2273546