About the Choreo-Poem Play
The production builds on the respective published poetry collections of both creators, Grace Storm and Thandiwe Nqanda, each of whom brings a wealth of expertise and personal insight into the themes of grief and survival.
It is a tender and intimate, thought-provoking portrayal of what it means to grieve, grow, and ultimately release.
The production offers a unique blend of narrative and live performance, fusing poetry, physical theatre and music, creating a multi-sensory experience that bridges the gap between page and stage. It invites audiences not only to listen but to feel—to sit with their emotions in ways that literature and performance often seek to evoke.
This work invites people to reflect on themes of loss, love, and healing—topics that resonate universally across cultures and personal experiences. The production also encourages dialogue on a subject often seen as taboo, giving grief a language through which people can connect, understand, and heal.
It explores how memory, honoring, and allowing can shape our experience of loss and lead to meaningful transformation.
Who We Are
About Grace Storm
Grace graduated BADA(hons) with majors in Dance Theatre composition and choreography in 2016. She then completed my MA in Applied Theatre (Cum Laude) with a focus on performance as research in 2021.
A performer, choreographer, author, spoken word artist, facilitator, lecturer and teacher.
She has choreographed various works and productions between 2016-2024, such as "Regression" which debuted at Dance Umbrella 2017, "Slip", performed at the Baxter Dance Festival as well as the JoYA festival in 2016-2017, and "Breathe" which was performed at the Sibikwa Arts Centre, “Wait/Weight”, performed at The Market Theatre in 2023 and more recently “Grieve, that is how you survive”, a two-hander choreo-poem developed from her poetry collection which debuted at the National Arts Festival in July 2024 amongst many others.
She started writing at the age of 13 and has written and self-published a collection of 3 anthologies on love, loss, and grief, recently launching her 2nd Edition collection in March 2024.
In October 2022, Grace represented South Africa at the Requiem for Justice Festival in Mexico City, an international Rally of artists, writers and thinkers from over 15 countries to manifest the role that art plays to protest against injustice.
She continues to create and perform her works, creating new explorative ways of merging her skills and art forms in various ways. Her recent projects focuses on grief studies and finding ways in which to articulate experiences of loss in order to find joy and healing through the process of grieving.
About Thandiwe Nqanda
Thandiwe is a South African-born poet. In her 13 years of writing, she has partaken in both local and international projects, such as 16DaysOfActivism16Poets,
performing her poem “Energy” on totallyradio in Brighton, UK (2021), participated at Word N Sound Poetry Slam in 2020.
Former Guest Poet of State of the
Nation Address, SONA (2022, People’s Voice). She has also recently been a part of The Open Book Festival 2024 with her self-published book
No Time To Mourn.
Her audience reach is inclusive of various African countries such as Zimbabwe and Namibia, and extends as far as the UK, USA and Germany. This afforded her the gift of writing and composing “IT IS TIME, a musical poetry show.”
More recently she performed “Grieve, that is how you survive”, a two-hander developed from hers and Grace Storm’s poetry collections which debuted at the National Arts Festival in June 2024.