KENNEDY CENTER Gold Medal in the Arts SATURDAY,Gala APRIL 14, 2018 ZEITZ MUSEUM OF CONTEMPORARY ART AFRICA CAPE TOWN, SOUTH AFRICA Stephanie and Karel Komárek, Co-Chairs The Kennedy Center International Committee on the Arts welcome you to the Kennedy Center Gold Medal in the Arts Gala celebrating Basil J.R. Jones and Adrian P. Kohler John Kani Sibongile Khumalo Dr. Gcina Mhlophe McCoy Mrubata Gold Medal in the Arts Past Recipients 2005 ST. PETERSBURG 2012 MADRID OLIVIA DE HAVILLAND, PEDRO ALMODÓVAR, VALERY GERGIEV, MARTHA SARA BARAS, PLÁCIDO INGRAM, IRWIN JACOBS, DOMINGO, PACO PEÑA, MÆRSK MCKINNEY MØELLER, TAMARA ROJO TREVOR NUNN 2013 PRAGUE 2006 LONDON JIŘÍ BĚLOHLÁVEK, SOŇA DARCEY BUSSELL, ČERVENÁ, KAREL KOMÁREK, MICHAEL CAINE, JUDI DENCH, JR.,MAGDALENA KOŽENÁ JEREMY IRONS, JACOB ROTHSCHILD, LILY SAFRA 2014 UAE HOOR AL-QASIMI, BADR 2007 BEIJING JAFAR, QUINCY JONES, SONG ZUYING, ARIF AND FAYEEZA NAQVI, MINISTER SUN JIAZHENG ZAKI AL NUSSEIBEH 2008 BUENOS AIRES 2015 PARIS NORMA ALEANDRO, JULIO PIERRE BOULEZ, LESLIE BOCCA, PALOMA HERRERA, CARON, ALEXANDRE DESPLAT, MERCEDES SOSA YASMINA REZA 2009 ISTANBUL 2016 DUBLIN CIHAT AŞKIN, CANA GÜRMEN, SIR JAMES GALWAY, SIR VAN AHMET KOCABIYIK MORRISON, FIONA SHAW, JIM SHERIDAN, ENDA WALSH 2010 TOKYO TADAO ANDO, MIDORI, 2017 MILAN KANZABURO NAKAMURA, SALVATORE ACCARDO, YUKIO NINAGAWA CARLOS BULGHERONI, RENATO BRUSON, GIANANDREA NOSEDA The Kennedy Center International Committee on the Arts proudly bestows the Gold Medal in the Arts in recognition of extraordinary achievement in the arts each year at its international summit. The Committee awards inspiring individuals, whose lifetime achievements have created, nurtured, supported, and championed the world’s greatest arts and artists. Performance Handspring Puppet Company Handspring Puppet Company was founded in 1981 and, for 30 years, has grown under the leadership of Artistic Director Adrian Kohler and Executive Producer Basil Jones, both of whom are honorees tonight. Based in Cape Town, the company provides an artistic home and professional base for a group of performers, designers, theatre artists, and technicians. Handspring’s work has been presented in more than 30 countries. The Handspring Trust for Puppetry Arts, a non-profit organization, was established in 2010. The trust’s programs identify, mentor, and champion the next generation of puppetry artists through workshops, academic engagement, and the support of ongoing projects in rural areas and townships. Cape Town Opera Africa’s premier opera company, Cape Town Opera provides a stage that allows local talent to launch international careers and attracts international talent to South Africa. As the nation’s largest permanent nonprofit performing arts organization, Cape Town Opera fosters the expression of a national identity through the creation and performance of new South African operas and musicals. The Cape Town Opera Studio Training Program is the only comprehensive advanced curriculum of its kind for young graduate singers in South Africa. The program gives singers with soloist potential the opportunity to consolidate and refine their technique and stage skills before launching professional careers. Zeitz Museum of Contemporary Art Africa (Zeitz MOCAA) MOCAA is a public not-for-profit contemporary art museum which collects, preserves, researches, and exhibits 21st century art from Africa and its Diaspora; hosts international exhibitions; develops supporting educational and enrichment programs; encourages cultural understanding; and guarantees access for all. Over 100 galleries, spread over nine floors, are dedicated to a large cutting edge permanent collection; temporary exhibitions; and Centers for Art Education, Curatorial Excellence, Performative Practice, Photography, the Moving Image, and the Costume Institute. The grain silo complex where Zeitz MOCAA is located was once, at 57 meters, the tallest building in sub-Saharan Africa. After its opening in August 1924, it became integral to South Africa’s industrial and agricultural development and allowed for significant economic activities in Table Bay Harbor. Today, with a state-of-the-art design by internationally acclaimed designer Thomas Heatherwick, it remains an impressive icon, easily recognizable on the Mother City’s skyline. 2018 Gold Medal Recipients Biographies Basil J.R. Jones and Adrian P. Kohler Basil Jones and Adrian Kohler met at The Michaelis School of Fine Art in Cape Town 1981 and have been together ever since. After graduating from art school with the Michaelis Prize, Kohler joined at the Space Theatre, then South Africa’s only theatre open to all. Jones and Kohler subsequently left the country, working in community theatre in Birmingham UK. They then spent 3 years in Botswana, where Kohler ran the University of Botswana’s National Popular Theatre Program and Jones worked as a graphic artist and the National Museum and Art Gallery. They also became active members of MEDU, the ANC’s cultural organization under the leadership of Mongane Wally Serote and subsequently Tami Mnyele. In January 1981, they returned to Cape Town, South Africa to form Handspring Puppet Company with Jill Joubert and Jon Weinberg – all former art school students. Jones and Kohler continue to run the company. For 5 years they traveled in a caravan/truck touring children’s shows to schools throughout southern Africa and performing at theatres in the school holidays. With the declaration of the Emergency in 1985, visiting schools was no longer possible and they relocated the company to Johannesburg working in children’s TV. There they set up the not-for-profit company, Handspring Trust, and raised funding from international donors to make a multimedia science education program, acknowledged in Britain and the USA as a leading example of creative engagement in this sphere. Whilst in Johannesburg, Handspring began working with directors who had seen their first piece for adult audiences, Episodes of an Easter Rising directed by Esther van Ryswyk for the Baxter Theatre. They participated in productions at the Market Theatre with Barney Simon, Malcolm Purkey, and Mark Fleishman. In 1982, they began a ten-year collaboration with director William Kentridge. Their plays all featured Kentridge’s charcoal animations and Adrian Kohler’s puppets. Woyzeck on the Highveld, Faustus in Africa, Ubu and the Truth Commission, Il Riturno d’Ulisse and Confessions of Zeno won many awards in South Africa and toured widely in Europe and North America. In 1999 Handspring relocated to Cape Town and there followed three plays, which presented animals as animals in the central roles – the world’s first company to do this. The third of these productions was War Horse, (2007), produced by the Royal National Theatre of Great Britain in collaboration with Handspring. This production became the most successful show ever mounted by the National Theatre and had extended seasons on Broadway and London’s West End. It continues to tour in the UK and China. Or You Could Kiss Me, written and directed by Neil Bartlett, premiered at the National Theatre in 2010 and featured the lives of two geriatric gay men. A Midsummer Night’s Dream directed by Tom Morris, 2013 played at The Bristol Old Vic and in the USA at the Spoleto Festival and the International Festival of Arts & Ideas in the Kennedy Centre in Washington D.C. Through their non-for–profit entity, Handspring Trust, they have a longstanding commitment to community theatre and the Ukwanda Puppetry and Design Collective. Handspring has received numerous awards including a Special Tony Award, an Olivier Award, as well as Drama Desk, Outer Critics Circle, and LA Drama Critics Circle awards. Kohler has had solo exhibitions at the Kennedy Center, South African National Gallery, Cape Town, and the Museum for African Art in New York. His puppets are represented in public collections in Munich, Germany; Atlanta, Georgia; the Constitutional Court in Johannesburg; The Old Mutual Collection in Cape Town; and in the Victoria and Albert Museum, London. In 2012, the University of Cape Town awarded Jones and Kohler the degree of D.Lit. (honoris causa). Jones and Kohler were officially married in Oudtshoorn in 2007. They live in Kalk Bay, Cape Town. John Kani John Kani is an actor, a director and a playwright. On stage, John has appeared in, among others, The Blood Knot, Driving Miss Daisy, Othello, The Lion and the Lamb, Waiting for Godot, The Death of Bessie Smith, Playland, “Master Harold”… and the Boys, Hedda Gabler, and My Children! My Africa!, which earned him an Olivier Award and won him an AA life Vita Award in 1990 for his role as Mr. M. John has worked with playwright Athol Fugard since 1965 when he joined the Serpent Players at the Market Theatre; directing most of their plays and collaborating to create The Coat, The Last Bus, and Friday’s Bread on Monday, among others. As well as acting in Sizwe Banzi is Dead and The Island, John also co-wrote the plays with Fugard and Winston Ntshona and won a Tony Award® for Best Actor in 1975 for his performance in the productions, later earning an Evening Standard Award nomination during the shows’ run on the West End. John has taken these two shows to London, Paris, Stockholm, Montreal, and Washington, DC at the Kennedy Center. John’s film credits include The Wild Geese, The Grass is Singing, Marigolds in August, A Dry White Season, Sarafina!, and Saturday Night at the Palace for which he won a Taormina Golden Award at the Milan International Festival. He has also appeared in The Ghost and the Darkness with Michael Douglas and Val Kilmer, The Tichbourne Claimant with Robert Pugh and Sir John Gielgud, The Suit, Captain America: Civil War, and Black Panther. Nothing but the Truth, John’s debut as sole playwright, opened at Johannesburg’s Market Theatre in 2002 to critical acclaim, winning three Fleur du Cap Awards for Best Actor, Best New South African Play, and Best Director for Janice Honeyman. Nothing but the Truth played at the Baxter Theater and Opera House in Port Elizabeth prior to running in Johannesburg, Los Angeles, Boston, Brisbane, Sydney, and Lincoln Center in New York City.