About

I ran away from home between the ages of six and eight years old as a result of child abuse. I lived as a street child in different parts of Tanzania for over 10 years. In 2009 - 2013, I joined Makini, a Tanzanian non-profit organization that supports children and young people living on the streets. It was there that I first began to train and perform in traditional dance, modern dance, and theatre. This was the beginning of my artistic journey but my background and experiences continue to influence my work to this day.

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Samwel Japhet is a Tanzanian dance-movement artist and uses dance and performance as artistic expression for story-telling. He uses dance for expressing ideas and creating a space for reflection, awareness and discussion. In 2016, He graduated with a Diploma in Contemporary and Tanzanian Traditional dance from the MUDA Africa Dance School in Tanzania. In 2015, he co-founded a Tanzanian based non-profit dance company (Nantea Dance Company), where he has been co-curating a contemporary dance night event in Dar es Salaam, as a platform for young Tanzanian and African artists. This is a bi-annual event and has happened four times since 2018. He has also been co-coordinating an outreach dance project to reach dance artists across Tanzania. The aim is to share knowledge and experiences through dance workshops and seminars.

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Samwel has worked with choreographers such as Faustin Lenyekula (DRC, Congo), Johannes Wieland (Germany), Yolanda Gutiérrez & Projects (Hamburg, Mexico), Aloyce Makonde (Tanzania). During his professional training at the MuDa Africa Dance School he trained and worked with international companies and choreographers from different backgrounds. Following his graduation, he has continuously been participating in festivals, residencies, projects and trainings around the world, in UK, South Korea, Ethiopia, Germany, South Africa, Japan, Senegal, Portugal, Rwanda, Russia, Uganda and Kenya.

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In 2016, he began his choreographic solo works by creating a piece called ‘Children of the New World.’ This is a dance performance and an artistic expression about the impact of child abuse. Premiered at the Adey International Dance Festival in Ethiopia in 2017, in (Finland) at ACCAC Culture Festival 2021, (Germany) at TanzTangente Dance Festival 2020, in (Portugal) at MEXE International Community Arts Festival 2019, in (South Africa) at My Body My Space; Public Arts Festival 2018 in (Tanzania) at An evening of Celebration & Transformation of Ending Violence Against Children by the Global Network of Religions for Children (GNRC) 2018 in Tanzania. In 2019, he created his second solo work called ‘On the Other Side of Being,’ which is a dance performance talks about consciousness in human beings and how it affects our culture and our identity. This piece challenges and questions the way Tanzanian society judges and portrays people with mental illness. This piece has been performed at the My Body My Space; Public Arts Festival 2019 in South Africa, Sejong International Dance Festival in South, Korea, TanzTangente Dance Festival 2020 in Germany and Let’s Dance International Fronties 2020 in the UK.

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In his work, Samwel reflects on situations that happen within our societies. He creates dance performances inspired by reality. I draw from every experience in life. I also draw something from each person I meet. I am influenced by people and I want to challenge existing perspectives while giving room for new perspectives to emerge. Dance is the language I use to bring awareness to social problems. Dance is my language for storytelling and I believe it can change how we see the world.