The Baxter Theatre Centre is a

performing arts The performing arts are arts such as music, dance, and drama which are performed for an audience. They are different from the visual arts, which are the use of paint, canvas or various materials to create physical or static art objects. Perform ...

complex in

Rondebosch Rondebosch is one of the Southern Suburbs of Cape Town, South Africa. It is primarily a residential suburb, with shopping and business districts as well as the main campus of the University of Cape Town. History Four years after the first Dutch s ...

, a suburb of

Cape Town Cape Town ( af, Kaapstad; , xh, iKapa) is one of South Africa's three capital cities, serving as the seat of the Parliament of South Africa. It is the legislative capital of the country, the oldest city in the country, and the second largest ...

South Africa South Africa, officially the Republic of South Africa (RSA), is the southernmost country in Africa. It is bounded to the south by of coastline that stretch along the South Atlantic and Indian Oceans; to the north by the neighbouring countri ...

. The Baxter, as it is often known, is part of the

University of Cape Town The University of Cape Town (UCT) ( af, Universiteit van Kaapstad, xh, Yunibesithi ya yaseKapa) is a public research university in Cape Town, South Africa. Established in 1829 as the South African College, it was granted full university statu ...

; it is also the second largest performing arts complex in Cape Town, after the Artscape Theatre Centre.

History

The Baxter opened on 1 August 1977. It was named after former Mayor of Cape Town

William Duncan Baxter William Duncan Baxter (14 June 1868 – 7 January 1960) was a businessman, politician, and the Mayor of Cape Town, South Africa, from 1907 to 1908. The theatre, generally known as "The Baxter", a performing arts complex in Rondebosch, a suburb ...

, who left money to the University of Cape Town specifically for the construction of a theatre centre. As well as improving the facilities available to the university's Drama Department, the Baxter also provided an alternative to the government-run Nico Malan Theatre Centre (now the Artscape Theatre Centre) for the staging of large productions. This was particularly important before the end of

apartheid Apartheid (, especially South African English: , ; , "aparthood") was a system of institutionalised racial segregation that existed in South Africa and South West Africa (now Namibia) from 1948 to the early 1990s. Apartheid was ...

; while the Nationalist government could prevent the Nico Malan from staging productions that challenged its views, they could not exert the same degree of control over the Baxter, which was protected by the university's

academic freedom Academic freedom is a moral and legal concept expressing the conviction that the freedom of inquiry by faculty members is essential to the mission of the academy as well as the principles of academia, and that scholars should have freedom to teac ...

Venues and programme

The Baxter has three venues: *the 665-seat Main Theatre *the 638-seat Concert Hall, with a Von Beckerath organ *the 172-seat Golden Arrow Studio The Baxter Theatre conducts workshops aimed at the youth and at benefitting previously disadvantaged communities. The Zabalaza Outreach program works towards developing community skills and hosts the annual Baxter Zabalaza Theatre Festival which is a platform for previously disadvantaged theatre talent.

Notes

External links

Baxter Theatre Centre website
Cape Town culture University of Cape Town Theatres in South Africa Concert halls in South Africa Theatres completed in 1977 Tourist attractions in Cape Town Rondebosch {{SouthAfrica-struct-stub

History

Venues and programme

See also

Notes

External links