Happy World Day of Theatre for Children and Young People!
The arts can transform the lives of children and families everywhere, and everyone deserves to have access to that. Z-arts is all about providing great art for children and young people, but we thought for this post we would focus on what other people are saying. Sometimes it’s easy to get caught up in things and forget that the world is so much bigger than here – so here are somethings from people across the world. There’s a video from South Korea, and messages for World Day from South Africa and Australia.
ASSITEJ World Day of Theatre for Children and Young People
This is a day by ASSITEJ that enables everyone interested in theatre for young audiences to connect with the idea of world day and ‘make the case’ for children’s entitlement to theatre and the arts.
For 2019 the World Day video has been created by ASSITEJ South Korea
(You can activate the subtitles by clicking CC in the video player.)
Messages
Every year ASSITEJ put out messages to advocate for children and young people’s entitlement to theatre and the arts. This year’s messages has been written by Yvette Hardie (South Africa), President of ASSITEJ, Joyee, 8 years old, and Jojo, 11 years old, attendants at the House of Muchness, in Brunswick, Australia. Give them a read.
ASSITEJ president Yvette Hardie says : “Children need to be offered to enjoy moments in community where they are reminded of what we share, and where they are able to appreciate the multiple
realities of what it means to be human.”
Joyee says : “Without theatre, there would be no imagination. Everyone wouldn’t be able to be
themselves. Without stories, everyone would be bored all the time. A bit gloomy – they wouldn’t
really feel very nice.”
Jojo says : “I love theatre where you have to use your imagination, your own imagination which is
different from everyone else’s. Because the things in the show are hard to see or aren’t there, you
have to imagine them. You make them up. And then you can see them really well.”
You can read the full messages here. And trust me, they’re really worth it.