NLA | Freedom Park Phase1

FREEDOM PARK - ISIVIVANE AND INFORMATION KIOSK

Valorised by many as ‘the very essence of Freedom Park’ this sacred shrine is the symbolic ‘final resting place of the spirits of those who died in the struggle for freedom’. At his address on the occasion of the handover of the first phase of the project Mbeki stated that

[t]his is a place to which all of our people of all colours, cultures, ages and beliefs, men and women, will come to pay their quite tribute to those whose memory will never be extinguished, who will live on in every generation that lives, summoning each to be the standard bearers of the cause of the freedom of all humanity.

Isivivane is essentially a storytelling place. It is a place of refuge, with a narrative that expresses the “final resting place for all the people who fell in the fight for freedom in eight conflict events, which eventually shaped South Africa.”

The concept of Isivivane is also derived from the verb viva, which means ‘fervour, concentration of energy and commitment to solidarity and oneness of purpose’. Isivivane at Freedom Park, therefore, was not conceived as a Western-style memorial or shrine, but rather is intended as a performative site of embodied memory, ritual and spirituality, and is infused with a wealth of symbolic references, which have universal appeal.