Africa’s No 1 Arts Bookstore and Publisher

Given that one of our chief objectives at David Krut Publishing is to improve the level of writing on the arts in South Africa, we have decided to start at home. We have a weekly in-house writing workshop at which staff members submit short pieces to be commented upon by their colleagues, a few of whom are experienced writers themselves. Many of the pieces end up on our website which is now one of the top blog sites in the country (eighteenth place at the last check!). We try put the pieces up on the site as quickly as possible which means that they are sometimes works in progress (though carefully checked for typos and spelling errors). That way we can all comment on the essays (as can you) and then the writer can rework the draft. This also inculcates in our writing team the important concept of drafting and redrafting which is a crucial component of writing (a process that is often foregone in journalism because of the need to meet deadlines).

We would like, in time, to extend the writing workshop so that we have outside writers coming in to mentor our writers or improve their own skills, but in the meantime you can see some of the fruits of our labours at the following pages on the site:

A piece by Bazukile Diko, our website maintenance person and one of the co-ordinators of the Taxi Art Education Programme, on artist Avhashoni Mainganye - we will work on this in our next in-house workshop so that she can add to and refine the essay:
http://www.davidkrutpublishing.com/dkp/latest/2007/07/avhashoni/

An essay by Lara Koseff, our in-house designer and researcher. This essay has been through two draft and will be revised and reposted this week. Lara’s colleagues offered comments in the workshop and also on the site, which you can also view:
http://www.davidkrutpublishing.com/dkp/latest/2007/07/wilma-cruise-the-mother-goose-suite/

I will keep you updated on the progress of the team, meanwhile here is a photo of our lovely faces!

Keywords: Arts-and-Culture, by-Bronwyn-Law-Viljoen, News, Writing