DR LLIANE LOOTS is a Lecturer in the Drama and Performance Studies Programme at the University of KwaZulu-Natal. She completed her PhD in 2018 interrogating contemporary dance histories on the African continent. Loots holds the founding position of Artistic Director/Curator for the Centre for Creative Arts’s annual JOMBA! Contemporary Dance Experience – a festival that turned 27 in 2025. Loots founded FLATFOOT DANCE COMPANY OS O professional dance company in 2003 when it grew out of a dance training programme that started in 1994. Loot’s has written extensively on contemporary dance histories in Africa and is currently working with Prof Yvette Hutchison (Warwick University) on a UKRI funded project looking at dance, disability and citizenship in Africa. Loots was awarded the Chevalier des Arts et des Lettres (Knight in the Order of Arts and Letters) by the French government in 2017 for her work (both artistic and curatorial) in the South African dance sector.
ROBERT SSEMPIJJA is a Ugandan Contemporary Dance Artist – with a career in formal and informal dance settings as well as a person who works in the era of postcolonialism and decolonisation. He has practiced his art on three different continents with different companies, projects and choreographers like Christoph Winkler (Germany), Nora Chipaumire (New York/Zimbabwe), Qudus Onikeku (Nigeria), and Patrick Acogny (France/Senegal). Life continues to develop new aesthetics and forms of dance. His dance film ALIENATION!, takes the viewer on a journey of self-discovery around the decolonial questions.that interrogate what home is and where we belong. Ssempijja’s film (like much of his dance work) lyrically questions how Ugandans can expect to grow and thrive as a city and as a people when the foundation they have was neither built nor meant for them.
Ondiege Matthew is a dancer, choreographer, and DANCE INTO SPACE founder, a group of contemporary dancers, socially engaged performance artists, and the only mixed ability contemporary dance company in East Africa. Through exploring personal stories and employing participatory methods, the company under Ondiege creates touring productions, teaches dance, empowers people with different abilities, raises awareness on human rights issues, and strengthens self-advocacy. DANCE INTO SPACE works with other civil society members, creatives and government agencies, carries out civic education, constitutional education and human rights awareness among citizens in Kenya through the creative arts. As a leading contemporary dance choreographer as well as an activist, Ondiege has been using the mixed ability dance projects as a creative approach to inclusiveness since 2005. The projects address stigma while tackling punitive cultural practices that promote discrimination and basic human rights violations among people with disability. He continues to produce new and original works with his team.