Zimbabwe may be recovering from acute political and economic crisis, but the Harare International Festival of the Arts proves that, against all the odds, the country's culture scene is thriving.

"In some small ways, HIFA represents what Zimbabwe could be," says artistic director Manuel Bagorro, who founded the festival in the late 1990s. "It brings people together from all sectors of society to celebrate something positive and optimistic about our country." This year's festival ran from 27 April to 2 May 2010, and united Zimbabwean artists with international performers to celebrate the importance of the arts in promoting change, and challenging oppression of all kinds.

Prominent headliners included the celebrated Malian musician Salif Keita, Swedish/Argentinian singer Jose Gonzales and Haitian songstress Emeline Michel.

Bagorro, a Zimbabwean classical pianist, left Zimbabwe in 1983 to pursue a music career abroad, partly because of what he describes as a sense of isolation in his country. He returned to Zimbabwe during the optimism of the late 1990s, and HIFA, a non-profit, non-governmental organisation, was the result.

"The festival offers an opportunity to recognise shared experience," says Bagorro. "Audiences are able to acknowledge that life may be hard, but we can still express our sadness, laughter, fears and hopes."

HIFA hosted back-to-back events at multiple locations across Harare; crucially, it aimed to be accessible to all, running outreach programmes for street children and staging free events for people who could not afford tickets. It showcased local music, theatre, dance, craft and visual arts, while offering local artists opportunities to network and collaborate.

 One Zimbabwean artist taking the stage this year was acclaimed Mbira (thumb piano) player and singer Hope Masike. Her stunning performance with Afro-fusion band Kakuwe, full of infectious optimism and energy and carried along by the bubbling rhythm of the marimba, had the audience dancing in the aisles. Many people sang enthusiastically along in Shona – many of the songs, Masike says, are about healing social problems.

A local festivalgoer, 24-year-old Dimitri Kwenda, was impressed. "HIFA is about relating to the reality of people's lives," he told me. For Kwenda, the festival is important because it facilitates freedom of expression and opens up discussions between artists and audience, initiating formal and informal post-performance debates within the relatively unfettered arena of the festival.

Sometimes this included surprising acts of political bravery. One major highlight of this year's festival was Anders Lustgarten's play You Cannot Escape Our Love, which transferred from London's Finborough theatre. The play, originally entitled Black Jesus, was altered at the last minute because the cast were anxious about conveying a potentially didactic message about Zimbabwe to Zimbabweans. As a result, this story about transitional justice in Zimbabwe became a kind of play-within-a-play: a story that not only blurred the lines between victims and perpetrators of political violence, but also prompted debates about artistic responsibility and ownership.

It hasn't always been easy obtaining official permission for controversial work, according to Bagorro: all scripts still need to be passed by the censors. And many artists have been fearful about coming to Zimbabwe, because of negative international press and fears about safety – not to mention doubts about whether it is appropriate to perform in a country experiencing apparently intractable political problems. "Many artists have cancelled over the years," says Bagorro. "But we try to reassure artists with our credentials as an independent, civic organisation that has achieved important development objectives for artists and the Zimbabwean community at large."

Organising an arts festival in a country experiencing hyperinflation and with a currency in freefall provided another set of challenges. Budgeting and risk-evaluation proved futile, Bagorro says, and power cuts, water and fuel shortages also caused problems.

But, more optimistically, this year audience figures were up - jumping by 5,000 to just under 60,000 people in attendance.

And HIFA also benefitted from an impressive degree of backing from inside Zimbabwe as well as out, with global corporations, embassies and arts organisations providing support and funding.

Significantly, too, the festival has injected funds into Zimbabwe's long-suffering travel industry, attempting to reconnect the country once again with the outside world. Richard and Rosie Tillett, a couple from Devon who I bumped into at the festival site, had timed their visit to coincide with HIFA. "We had anxieties about visiting Zimbabwe because of what we hear in the media," Rosie Tillett says. "But the festival overturned our expectations. We were glad to see that audiences were racially mixed, with no apparent tensions or segregation."

Her husband was similarly impressed: "The festival was exciting, exuberant, multicultural, challenging and very much at odds with the idea of a nation in decline."

By The Guardian UK

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