Justin “Jiggs” Thorne is a respected festival director with a strong pedigree in creating, developing, and promoting African arts and culture. He holds a Bachelor’s Degree in Drama and Politics from the University of Kwazulu Natal in South Africa, and honed his experience as a cultural industry creative and professional by working at the Johannesburg Market theatre and visiting the iconic Johannesburg jazz club Kippie’s during his time in South Africa.
Pan-African Cultural Promoter, Entrepreneur, Social Justice Advocate
In 2000, Jiggs co-founded House On Fire with his brother Sholto Thorne in his native Eswatini, House on Fire is a creative and community and cultural hub for music performances and live cultural events. One of the events that he started in 2007 became the MTN Bushfire International Festival of the Arts, recognized by the BBC as a “Top African Festival” among its many accolades, and attracts an audience of over 22,000 visitors annually from around the world. The festival is a reflection of Jiggs’ artistic and social development vision and features three days of performances and activations built around a call to social action entitled #BringYourFire.
With the MTN Bushfire festival, Jiggs has created an internationally known and respected festival of the arts, built on pillars of inclusivity, tolerance, sustainability and diversity. As the co-Director, He continues to shape it as a creative platform that inspires the growth and development of the arts, and addresses the need to empower marginalized communities in his native Eswatini and in Southern Africa in general. The festival’s #BRINGYOURFIRE call to action encourages a collective contribution towards positive social and environmental change, Bushfire has established sustainable initiatives that empower the youth, women, and LGBTQI communities. Bushfire also raises funds for some of the more critical social needs that face our country through its festival beneficiaries, Young Heroes and boMake Rural Projects.
Jiggs is also founder and co-Director of the Standard Bank Luju Food & Lifestyle Festival, as well as a founding member of IGODA, the Southern African Music Festival Circuit. a network of festival that also includes the Azgo Festival Maputo founded by our member Paulo Chibanga (Mozambique). Jiggs’ most recently developed project, CollaboNation, funded by the European Union supported Sound Connects Fund, an initiative by the Music In Africa Foundation (MIAF) and Goethe-Institut, is a Pan-African music collaboration project that aims to connect and unite the region through a series of unique music collaborations, supporting the weaving together of Africa’s rich and diverse musical genres and building linkages between cultural industries and networks. The success of CollaboNation has sparked Bushfire Records, a dynamic new label producing the CollaboNation projects.
Moving Forward
Jiggs believes that a well-packaged creative product can inspire the African economy at large, and that authenticity is what will set Africans apart and gives Africa a competitive advantage in the global culture economy. Through his diverse creative work, and as a leading Festival Director, Jiggs has had a major impact on the artistic landscape of the Southern African region and beyond. With his three main projects Bushfire Festival, IGODA, and Collabonation, as well as some of his other projects, Jiggs continues to develop creative platforms of expression that provide meeting points of culture and that aid in collaborative processes that address the challenges facing Africans all, from local to global communities.
At Arts Connect Africa, we recognize and celebrate Justin Jiggs Thorne as an impact maker on the African continent, because his efforts are in line with our own goals as a collective.
