Ukuzimasa: When Visibility Is Mistaken for Opportunity

What it means to be present, celebrated and still excluded from meaningful trade.

There is a familiar scene that plays out at many conferences, festivals, government events and corporate activations. It is a scene that has become so normal within the creative sector that many people no longer stop to question it.

The conference venue is alive long before the programme formally begins. Delegates arrive in waves carrying laptops, notebooks and branded tote bags. Conversations begin almost immediately at the registration desk as people reconnect over coffee stations and exchange introductions between panel sessions and networking breaks. Event coordinators move quickly across the venue making sure everything is in place. Photographers capture moments for social media while speakers prepare for discussions, presentations and panel sessions unfolding across the programme.

And somewhere within all of this movement and energy, the crafters are set up.

Their tables are carefully arranged with beadwork, woven baskets, handmade earrings, textiles, ceramics and cultural accessories carrying hours of labour, technical skill and inherited knowledge. Some products hold stories passed down across generations. Others reflect contemporary interpretations of culture and identity. Together, they soften the venue. They make the conference space feel textured, grounded and culturally alive in ways that corporate branding alone never could.

People are naturally drawn to the tables throughout the day.

“This is beautiful.”

“How much is this?”

“Can I get it in a different colour?”

“Do you have a business card?”

“I’ll definitely support you.”

Sometimes delegates pause to ask about the meaning behind certain patterns or colours. Sometimes they take photographs for social media. Sometimes they carefully hold a product in their hands while listening to the story behind it. And for the crafter sitting behind the table, each interaction carries a small sense of hope. Maybe this person will buy something. Maybe this conversation will lead to an order after the conference. Maybe this opportunity will become something more sustainable.

Meanwhile, the conference continues around them. Panels continue. More coffee is served. More photographs are taken. More conversations unfold across the venue as people move between panel discussions, networking sessions and presentations about industries, growth, innovation and the future. Yet somehow, very few people stop to think about the crafters sitting just outside those rooms and their own contribution to the economies being discussed.

And in many ways, the crafters help create the atmosphere that makes these gatherings feel memorable. Their presence transforms otherwise sterile venues into spaces with warmth, identity and cultural presence. Without them, many of these conferences and activations would feel disconnected from the very communities and cultures they often claim to celebrate.

But over time, I have developed a growing discomfort around these experiences.

Not because people are intentionally cruel. In many cases, organisers genuinely believe they are creating opportunities for crafters by inviting them into these spaces. Delegates also engage with sincerity and excitement. They admire the products. They compliment the work. They appreciate the creativity and craftsmanship before them.

The discomfort comes from something more subtle and perhaps more dangerous precisely because it is rarely questioned deeply.

Somewhere along the way, visibility became confused with economic opportunity.

What is often framed as support for crafters sometimes functions as a form of participation where the crafter absorbs almost all the cost of being present while everybody else involved in the event is financially compensated for their contribution.

The venue is paid.

The caterers are paid.

The equipment hire is paid.

The speakers are paid.

The organisers are paid.

The photographers are paid.

But the crafter is expected to arrive with products, spend the entire day exhibiting and leave with the hope that exposure might eventually turn into income.

Creative entrepreneur Thozama Kuza exhibiting handmade cultural products at the Eastern Cape Export Symposium hosted at the East London ICC. Images like these often represent visibility, participation and cultural celebration, while also raising important questions about how creative labour is valued within event economies.

I have come to call this experience ukuzimasa.

Literally, ukuzimasa refers to the act of attending or being present at an event, gathering or ceremony. But within isiXhosa culture, the meaning carries greater depth than physical attendance alone. Ukuzimasa speaks to honouring an invitation, participating fully in community life and offering support, solidarity and presence through one’s attendance. It reflects an understanding that presence itself carries social and spiritual meaning. To attend is not simply to occupy space. It is to contribute attentiveness, support and collective participation to the experience.

Perhaps that is why this contradiction has stayed with me for so long.

Because crafters are indeed participating fully in these spaces. They bring beauty, atmosphere, identity and cultural presence into the room. Their products help shape how people experience the event itself. They contribute to the emotional and aesthetic success of the gathering.

But economically, the exchange often remains deeply uneven.

What is rarely considered is the actual cost carried by the crafter in order to participate. Preparing for exhibitions requires days and sometimes weeks of production beforehand. Products must be carefully made, packaged, transported and displayed. For many handmade cultural products, time itself forms part of the value embedded within the work. Every stitched bead, woven detail and hand-finished process carries labour that cannot be separated from the final product.

Yet despite this, many crafters are invited into spaces where there is little intentional thinking around trade itself.

One of the first things I learned while studying Public Relations Management was the importance of knowing your product and knowing your audience. Understanding a product also means understanding who is willing and financially able to buy it. In many of these exhibition spaces, crafters are often positioned before audiences that may admire cultural products but are not necessarily the intended market for them.

This becomes especially difficult when handmade cultural products continue to be framed through language that diminishes their value. For a long time, I used the word “crafter” because it is the language most commonly used within the sector. But over time, I started questioning what the term itself reduces.

What many of these businesses produce are not simply decorative “craft items”. They are handmade cultural products carrying memory, symbolism, technical skill and inherited knowledge. They hold stories. They preserve practices passed down across generations. They carry identity and meaning in ways that industrial production cannot replicate.

And yet the market often continues to engage these products as though they exist somewhere between hobby and decoration rather than as serious creative and economic work.

And yet the market often continues to engage these products as though they exist somewhere between hobby and decoration rather than as serious creative and economic work.

You see it in the surprise around pricing.

“That expensive?”

“Can’t you make it cheaper?”

“Why does handmade cost so much?”

These questions reveal something much deeper about how cultural labour is understood and valued. Too often, people admire the final product without fully seeing the production ecosystem behind it — the labour, time, transport, preparation, cultural knowledge and years of skill required to create it.

These experiences are part of what made me realise that the creative sector does not only need visibility. It needs spaces intentionally designed for trade.

Creatives should not only be invited to showcase products in ways that make conferences and activations feel culturally rich. They should also be connected to real buyers — people who not only appreciate the products aesthetically, but who are willing and financially able to buy them at the value required for the business to sustain itself.

Because admiration alone cannot build sustainable creative economies.

And perhaps that is the deeper question we need to confront within the cultural and creative sector:

Are we building spaces where creatives merely attend, decorate and contribute atmosphere?

Or are we building systems where they can genuinely trade, grow and build livelihoods from the value they create?