Hailing from Kampala, Uganda, Rap Poet speaks to us about his country, his city and his community, with an insight into the creative community that he belongs to.
Beatfreeks: Rap Poet! Great to speak to you again, tell us a little about where you live and work.
Rap Poet: The Most favouring thing about my country Uganda is that it’s a pearl of Africa with its green nature, trees & good weather every day. The creative scene in Uganda is so busy and competitive, each day artists are coming up with projects, events and it’s a lot of poetry, music and art exhibitions events every year in Uganda.
BF: Wow, sounds like there’s lots going on, how strong is the creative community?
RP: The creative community is strong in that every art genre has come up with associations where they gather and share there thoughts about their work and how to build the creative industry better. So far as poets we now have a poetry association which represents all poetry clubs/houses in Uganda which is called Poetry Association of Uganda (PAU), as well as many associations like in music, visual art so that it helps to see how the Government of Uganda could support them when they are in groups or associations.
BF: It’s great to hear that there is a strong community around art in Uganda, how important is art to your community and why do you think art is important for society?
RP: Art is important to my community because it creates awareness to the local people who are scared to attend art exhibitions, poetry events, music festivals and brings them to get to know that art is for every one not only for certain people. Art is Important to society because it creates job opportunities for the youth who are out of schools and cannot continue with studies.
BF: Do You Feel there is enough Support for Artists?
RP: Woah that’s a hard question I must say because as in my country Uganda because of our political background it’s really hard for the our government leaders in power to support artists since mostly our government has a belief that the arts sector is not contributing much to the economy and they tend to focus more on the science sector. But mainly the whole problem starts from our education system where even in most families few parents support their children who are studying arts subjects so I think generally there is not enough support for artists in my country.
BF: What are your hopes for Art /Creativity in your community?
RP: I hope for more arts bodies like art organisations to be put up in my community to support the art sector because if not, artists will stay on there own supporting each other to create such art centres and more art structures for themselves to continue growing their art careers.
BF: Thanks for that insight Rap Poet, looking forward to catching up again.