Catch street parades, free art, fest award winners

[caption id="attachment_40565" align="alignright" width="405"] OUR NEW SOUTH AFRICA: Jennifer Steyn, left, and Kertrice Maitisa act in Mike van Graan's 'Rainbow Scars', a Fringe play which is on at 10am today and tomorrow[/caption]

THE show ain't over until the fat lady sings – and the fat lady of the National Arts Festival only sings tonight at 10pm, when the final movie screens. And, believe it or not, after nine days on the boil there are still hundreds of shows, exhibitions and stalls to amaze, amuse and bemuse.

You can still catch the work of at least three of the Standard Bank Young Artist Award winners, with dance winner Nicola Elliot and filmmaker Jahmil XT Qubeka on the weekend programme and the magnificent photographs of the visual art winners, Hasan and Husain Essop, on display until tomorrow afternoon.

Here are a few other ideas for weekend visitors:

Enjoy the free public art and street parades

Many of the festival stars will take part in the closing annual street parades, one today and one tomorrow, including the talented father and son duo of Andrew and Daniel Buckland.

Titled Forty See More/Fortissimo,  to echo the festival's 40th anniversary, these colourful processions feature street dancers, marching bands, stilt-walkers and enormous puppets.

Didn't get a ticket to Hugh Masekela in Concert at 7pm tonight?

His jazz on the Main programme is sold out but there still are several other musical highlights. Nakhane Toure, for example, is on at 9.30pm tonight and this young singer from Alice, just down the road from Grahamstown, is tipped to be one of the next big things. Guitarist Matthew Mole will accompany Toure's high, haunting vocals.

On the jazz side, the Tribute to Victor Ntoni has been drawing crowds. For hip-hop beatbox fans, there is Oz duo of Jamie MacDowll and Tom Thum, and the indie lovers have been raving about Gary Thomas and Steve Newman.

Need Sunday spiritual sustenance?

Take communion at the Anglican cathedral in the centre of town, one service is at 7.30am and another at 9.30am.

If you have a spiritual bent, you may also enjoy the small Christian art exhibition 40 Stones in the Wall, which is in the Cory Room, next to the Long Table restaurant in High Street.

Can't get to Grahamstown?

If you are in Port Elizabeth you are in luck, as there are several art exhibitions here (a few were highlighted in Weekend Post last week), and two plays still to show at the Athenaeum.

Tonight at 7pm there is My Word! Redesigning Buckingham Palace, written and performed by Basil Appollis, and tomorrow the ballsy Lizz Meiring in Cheaper Than Roses.

Interested in political satire?

Try Rainbow Scars or The Return of the Ancestors, both biting works by the acclaimed Mike van Graan.

Just wanna have fun? Try Big Boys II or Big Girls,  the teenagers will love them.

Take in an art exhibition ... or two ... or five.

The Albany Museum in Somerset Street has a wonderful festival overview of works by 14 out of the past 30 Standard Bank Young Artists for Visual Art.

Another of this year's art highlights is Fabricate, a large display of the Handspring Puppet Company's work to date, upstairs at the Monument. Handspring puppets featured in festival play Ubu and the Truth Commission and also star in War Horse.

On the Fringe, you may not even manage to get round all of the exhibitions over two days so read the programme carefully (if you can't find a programme, it also is online).

After-dark party-animals can kick back at  Late Night Blues with the super-cool Blues Broers, just before midnight at St Aidan's.

And now for something completely different: South African thriller-crime writer Deon Meyer turns his hand to film, directing an Afrikaans version of The Last Tango in Paris tomorrow at 5.30pm, Die Laaste Tango.

Want to see a play but can't decide which one? Pick up a copy of the festival newspaper, Cue, and see which shows have won an Ovation award, then start with one of those. For the fabulous fat lady of the National Arts Festival, perhaps life really does begin at 40. - Gillian McAinsh