NATIONAL COMMUNITY ARTS RESEARCH TRAVEL EXPERIENCE
WHAT A NATIONAL RESEARCH JOURNEY REVEALS ABOUT DISTANCE, INFRASTRUCTURE AND SURVIVAL
By Mpho J Molepo
At The Creative Passport, we continue to ask a simple but urgent question:
What does the state of arts and culture look like when viewed from the ground, not from policy desks?
As national conversations increasingly turn to redress, access and sustainability in the arts, it has become clear that community arts cannot be discussed in abstraction.
They exist within specific geographies, infrastructures, and lived conditions that shape how creativity survives and evolves.
The National Community Arts Research Travel experience offers a rare window into these realities.
More than a research exercise, the journey across South Africa’s provinces exposed the physical distances, infrastructural limitations and operational pressures that define everyday life for community arts practitioners.
Long hours on the road, remote locations and uneven access to basic resources were not incidental challenges — they were central to understanding why community arts centres operate as they do, and why policy promises often struggle to translate into lived impact.
This article reflects on that journey, drawing from the experiences of the research team and the communities they engaged with.
It invites readers to consider how infrastructure, geography and survival-based models continue to shape community arts in South Africa, and why these realities must be placed at the centre of national policy and funding discussions.
Source: ATCA
Executive Summary
The community arts research process was intensive and demanding, requiring a high level of commitment from the research team.
It involved long hours on the road, extended periods spent outside home provinces, and travel across vast rural and semi-rural areas, often with limited infrastructure.
Provinces were shared among team members to manage the workload; however, Ms Bobby Rodwell undertook the exceptional responsibility of covering all nine provinces. This level of engagement required resilience, dedication, and a deep commitment to understanding the lived realities of community arts practitioners across the country.
The process itself revealed systemic challenges within the community arts sector, particularly the disproportionate allocation of funds towards transportation due to geographic spread, poor road infrastructure, and the remoteness of many community arts centres.
Source: DSAC
Methodology and Travel Overview
The research exposed the length and breadth of the country through extensive travel across multiple provinces.
Long hours were spent driving between towns and rural areas, highlighting the distances practitioners and communities must regularly navigate to access arts spaces.
The journey began in the Free State, with visits to Sasolburg, Welkom, Bloemfontein, and Botshabelo. From there, the team crossed into the Northern Cape, visiting Kimberley, Danielskuil, and Ditshosane.
In the Eastern Cape, the research involved significant travel. After landing in East London and collecting a vehicle, the team drove to Mthatha and surrounding regions.
Practitioners were brought together following long travel hours. The team then returned to East London for a convening at the Guild Theatre with Conduit and practitioners from surrounding areas, before travelling the following day to Port Elizabeth to engage practitioners from the broader Nelson Mandela Bay region.
The North West province offered a particularly revealing experience. Visits included Mafikeng, Vryburg, Swartruggens, Klerksdorp, Kanana, and Lobotlaane in the Bojanala District. The team encountered both developed roads and areas with little to no road infrastructure.
Mpumalanga, Limpopo, the Western Cape, KwaZulu-Natal, and Gauteng presented similar conditions.
In each province, efforts were made to travel across regions in order to gain a comprehensive understanding of how community arts centres operate in varied contexts.
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Image: Provincial Engagements
Source: ATCA
Key Findings
A significant number of community arts centres operate within severely dilapidated infrastructure.
Many buildings showed signs of neglect, including damaged roofs, broken windows, inadequate sanitation, and unsafe working conditions.
In some cases, centres were operating in repurposed or temporary structures not designed for arts programming, limiting their functionality and sustainability.
2. Ownership and Land Tenure Issues
A recurring challenge across provinces was the lack of clear ownership or secure tenure of land and buildings occupied by community arts centres.
Many centres operate on land owned by municipalities, traditional authorities, or private entities without formal agreements.
This uncertainty restricts access to funding, as centres are unable to invest in infrastructure upgrades or long-term development without security of tenure.
3. Accessibility of Community Arts Centres
Accessibility emerged as a major concern, particularly in rural areas.
Centres are often located far from main roads, with poor or non-existent transport routes. This affects attendance, participation, and outreach, especially for young people, persons with disabilities, and elderly community members.
Limited public transport options further isolate these centres from the communities they aim to serve.
In rural areas, community arts centres operate under survival-based models rather than sustainable development models.
These centres often function as multi-purpose community spaces, serving educational, social, and cultural roles simultaneously, frequently without adequate resources.
While these models demonstrate resilience and innovation, they are largely unsupported by funding frameworks that fail to account for rural realities such as distance, infrastructure decay, and limited local economic activity.
5. Acknowledgements and Reflections
The research process was demanding and would not have been possible without the dedication and coordination of multiple stakeholders.
We acknowledge the excellent work carried out by members of the Department both national provincial and the federations, who ensured that all meetings were well coordinated.
Consideration was given to travel time between regions, and all logistical arrangements for practitioner engagements—including transport, catering, and venues—were effectively managed.
We extend our sincere appreciation to the research team from Wits University, led by Dr Chatikobo Munyaradzi and Ms Bobby Rodwell, for their rigorous work, commitment, and leadership throughout the process.
Special recognition is also given to the ATCA team, who spent countless days and long hours on the road to ensure the success of the research across provinces.
A special thank you to all members of provincial departments responsible for community arts for the hard work, travelling us and being on our side through the entire programme.
This journey taught us invaluable lessons in patience, resilience, and collaboration.
We are deeply grateful to all our partners for their support and cooperation, which made this extensive national research possible.
Source: ATCA
Conclusion
The research highlights the resilience and commitment of community arts practitioners despite structural and systemic challenges.
However, without targeted intervention to address infrastructure decay, land ownership insecurity, accessibility barriers, and context-specific rural models, the sustainability of community arts centres remains at risk.
The findings underscore the need for policy and funding approaches that are responsive to the geographic, economic, and infrastructural realities of community arts practice across the country.
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