2022 Africa Fest at McPike Park on August 20th: Faces of African Beauty
Members of the Africa Fest Committee include Ray Kumapayi (l-r), Koso Weller, Chris Jimieson, Ana Vakunta, John Tembei (partially hidden) and Vicki Ostien
By Jonathan Gramling
When Ray Kumapayi, president of the African Association of Madison, was brainstorming on what the 2022 Africa Fest theme would be, he was reviewing photos of wells put in by Strides for Africa and a feature that appears on the AAM listserv each week, courtesy of Anne Marie Dawson. It’s called Africa’s Week in Pictures.
“I see people doing different things in those photos,” Kumapayi said. Perhaps it is a political rally or women coming from the farm or rural and urban areas. I thought about all of those photos and thought about how beautiful they are. That’s why I came up with the theme ‘Faces of African Beauty.’ It can be found in those many places and situations. You just have to look deeper to see the beauty of those things.”
And that is the concern — and motivation — for many of the Africa Fest Committee members, that Africa and its 54 countries have been depicted in such a negative light, that people are not able to see the beauty that is Africa.
“Africa Fest is very important to us because this is one of the few opportunities that we have in Madison to showcase the beauty of Africa,” emphasized Ana Vakunta, a committee member. “It is very important to us to showcase what the media doesn’t actually show in terms of the beauty of Africa. What you see in the media usually is always negative. But on the other side, there are some beautiful things about Africa. We know that we have those negatives, but there are beautiful things that you don’t hear about on a daily basis. Those are attributes that you don’t see in the media. And this is one of the occasions where we want to showcase all of those things that people don’t show in the media to the Madison community.”
Vakunta is also a member of the African Women’s Association, which puts on the African Tent each year. They show some of the beauty of Africa. This year, it’s about clothing and accessories.
“With some of the garments, you will only find the fabric in Africa,” Vakunta said. “You don’t find it in the Western world. If you see it, someone must have gone home and brought it to us. And then the style that we use in sewing those clothes are unique to Africa. And then you have different kinds of headgear. There are so many styles that Africans wear that we don’t see on a daily basis.”
The African Tent will also exhibit the diversity of cultures in Africa.
“It will be showing different outfits and different looks from different parts of Africa,” Kumapayi added. “You’ll find people adorned with beads and different things like that. It showcases which parts of the African continent they come from. Our clothing and art is very different according to region. People in the Mediterranean area have cultural styles that are similar to West Africa, but there are differences. It’s nice for folks to come and see those differences.”
Wearing African garments can cause quite a stir.
“You don’t see people wearing African garments in their everyday lives,” Vakunta said. “Once in a while when I wear my African outfits and take it to the office, that day I will spend like 30 minutes answering questions in regards to that office. And the styles we sew those clothing with are not common styles. We want to respect the American culture way of life too to dress like them in some occasions. When we have this one, we bring out the best of our best African outfits.”
Africa Fest will feature seven food booths this year and over a dozen clothing and arts and crafts vendors who will line the festival grounds. And then there are the features like the Parade of Nations.
“The Parade of Nations is such an exciting feature,” Kumapayi said. “People are excited to carry the flag of their home country. When you have 54 nations and everyone wants to carry their flag around the festival grounds, it is a showcase that portrays the pride of each African nation. The idea came from The Hues 5th Anniversary Celebration held in front of the City-County Building in 2011. The Latino community held a parade of nations and it was beautiful. We loved it and decided to do it at Africa Fest. We had the country flags. We replaced any flags that were missing. The beauty of it is that white folks can carry the flags of the countries that aren’t represented by people that day so that every nation’s flag is carried and showcased. It brings about a unity of African nations by doing that.”
And there will also be a fashion parade, highlighting some of the garments featured in the African Tent.
“The fashion parade is another exciting thing,” Kumapayi said. “A lot of people sign up and then we get others who show up on the day of the event who want to showcase themselves. We showcase what they wear and what country they are from and at which occasion they would wear the outfit.”
And the heart and soul of Africa Fest is the music and the dancing that always power up the audience.
“This year, our entertainment on stage is mostly our local artists,” Kumapayi said. “We usually try to bring in an international artist. But this year, it fell through at the last minute, so we decided to focus on the local talent. We have Sista Sensi & The Buds Reggae Band from Jamaica, Tani Diakite & The Afro Funkstars will perform at night. Atimevu from Ghana will perform. We have the Nigerian Masquerade, which is always a very exciting thing. We have Mid-East by Mid-West that performs North African music. We also have Jimmy Sugar-Cane from Nigeria who is a solo artist. He has become very popular. We have a very nice group of local artists coming to entertain.”
Kumapayi and the others are proud to call the Madison area their home because of the intellectual and social curiosity of its people.
“Africa Fest provides awareness to people in the community,” Kumapayi emphasized. “Madison itself is a good environment for knowledge. People want to know about other people and how they carry out their everyday lives. It just makes it a lot easier when people are yearning for that knowledge. People may be thinking it is just about entertainment and a taste of African food. But it goes way beyond that. We founded the festival to provide awareness and provides opportunities to support the cultural diversity in Madison and beyond. People love the color and meeting different people.”
And Vakunta emphasized the rich cultural environment that festival goers will find.
“Sometimes it takes an African to present to the community that despite what you see in the media, we also have this, which shows the beauty of our continent,” Vakunta said. “We have very beautiful things as well on the continent. The day will be full of fun, friendship, and solidarity just to show that Madison is a very diverse community and very welcoming to everyone.”
At Africa Fest, everyone is African.