The Abuja Literary and Arts Festival known as ALitFest will commence its fourth workshops and a Bootcamp for 2021 within the week, aimed at empowering participants with skills and know-how that would lead to improved writing quality, networking, publishing, earning and overall capacity building.
A press statement obtained by WikkiTimes, indicated that the workshop will hold virtually for selected participants while the Bootcamp and poetry participants can win an impressive amount of N700,000 sponsored by Hamu Legal.
The multiple workshops and Bootcamp is scheduled to kick off on Saturday 25th September and round up on 2nd October 2021.
The statement says Intensive Bootcamp for creative is being organised with the support of Omaplex Law Firm, which will cover legal issues, leveraging digital media, fundraising, storytelling, and pitch competition that will allow participants to win the sum of N350,000.
“Participants in the Intensive Bootcamp for creatives which will cover legal issues, leveraging digital media, fundraising, storytelling, pitch competition can win a total grant of N350,000 and it will hold on October 1. It is being organised with the support of Omaplex Law Firm”, the statement read in part.
The press statement says participants who are interested to be part of the masterclasses are required to send two samples of work to a mail address; [email protected] with the festival hashtag and preferred workshop as the subject of the email.
The statement quoted the Festival Director, Teniola Tayo as giving example as ALIFEST21Poetry Workshop or ALIFEST21Screenwriting Workshop for Poetry or Screen Writing respectively.
He said the workshops were designed to help strengthen creatives in line with its theme for this year ‘Making Art Work’ adding that they are really passionate about helping creatives earn more from artistic pursuits.
This year’s writing workshop tagged ‘Writing for a Living will have two writers OdafeAtogun and Alithnayn as facilitators for four hours on September 27th. On 28th renowned poet and founder of Simply Poetry, Dike Chukwumerije will facilitate the Poetry Workshop tagged ‘Staging Poetry’.
Others are on 29th with a Writer and Story Developer, Aishat Abiri who will hold the screenwriting workshop and on the 30th, Visual Artist Mayowa Alabi will hold a 2-hour creative workshop titled “How to become an NFT artist and make money”. The copy also mentioned an Illustrator, Mylo Freeman, to be taking part in the illustration workshop, and all the workshops will be starting from 11 am.
ALITFEST is an annual celebration of the arts and literature from across the country and continent. Since its inception in 2018, the festival has explored insightful themes; In 2018 “Nigeria to the World”, 2019 “Arts and Social Consciousness”, 2020 “The Art of Empathy” and 2021 is “Making Art Work”
In its 2020 festival themed “The Art of Empathy.” organizers invited speakers and attendees to explore what they described as the importance, beauty and need for diversity and difference as well as the role of the creative in building bridges within and across societies, with the objective of addressing social issues.
This year’s festival is the 4th edition of ALitFest which comes up with a chosen theme ‘Making Art Work’. The idea behind this theme according to the organizers is to programme the festival around finding solutions to the challenges facing the literary space in Nigeria and in Africa, to take things a step beyond conversations by leveraging on people proximity to policymakers, to influence policymaking, and proactively equipping creatives with the skills they need to create sustainable livelihoods for themselves and others through their art.
The Festival program includes a series of workshops (poetry, fiction and screenwriting), a Bootcamp for creatives, a roundtable on data availability in the creative space, a poetry grand slam competition, a stage play, an art exhibition and music concerts.
It is to be hosted by the Abuja Literary Society ALS. ALS, a group of creative minds and patrons of arts, hosted the first literary festival tagged, “Nigeria to the World.” in Abuja Exhibition Pavilion in 2018, which was its 20th anniversary.
It was founded by Victor Anoliefo, Ike Anya, Ferdinand Agu and Ken Ike Okere in 1998 as an initiative to bring together writers, aspiring writers, book-lovers, intellectuals, and generally anyone with an interest in the literary arts looking to relax in a creative atmosphere. The Society holds regular activities including open mic sessions, book readings and literary workshops amongst others. Apart from the weekly meetings, ALS organizes periodic events that contribute to its overarching goal of building and sustaining a thriving literary space in Abuja.
