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“What are the potentials of growing Black patronage across the diaspora, and how can we build lasting infrastructure for cross-diasporic cultural exchange as a new generation of collectors emerges?” These questions guide Temperature Check, a traveling research and programming initiative launched by art advisory ISE-DA to take the pulse of Black cultural stewardship through the lens of collecting.
An exhibition of eleven works by the late painter, arts organizer, and mythic personality Samson Mnisi focused on what might be called his spiritual abstraction, which decenters the discrete object. Rainmaker celebrated a specifically African interrogation of abstraction, writes Setumo-Thebe Mohlomi.
Until May 11, the exhibition Joie Collective – Apprendre à flamboyer (Collective Joy: Learning to Shine) is showing at the Palais de Tokyo in Paris. Curated by Amandine Nana, a young curator who joined the institution’s team in 2023, it paints a portrait of communal festivities as a tool for social justice.
Writer Vusumzi Nkomo highlights the solo exhibition The Other Side of Now by Tuan Andrew Nguyen, on view at Zeitz MOCAA in Cape Town, South Africa. This exhibition presents films, sculptures, tapestry, and archival family photographs. Engaging with the transnational complexities left in the wake of colonial violence, it addresses the quieter narratives within Vietnamese, Senegalese, and Moroccan histories. While the exhibition has some weaknesses, it fosters a space for collective reflection and historical reclamation.
Transforming how audiences engage with 10+ years of C& content with Mellon Foundation support.
Mūhunyo Maina reviews a pertinent exhibition at NCAI in Nairobi, following protests against the 2024 Finance Bill, exploring ways to democratize art viewing.
The artist purposefully contributes to the sculptural visibility of various Black narratives as part of Germany's history and culture of remembrance.
The Moroccan artist known for his experimental and unconventional work passed away in May 2024. The curator Syham Weigant, his friend and colleague, highlights special moments of his life and career.
Find some impressions of the pavilions curated by Fadzai Veronica Muchemwa, Aindrea Emelife and Simon Njami.
In this conversation, C& AL editors Marny Garcia Mommertz and Cristian Baena reflect on a recent press trip to Martinique alongside the artist and curators of the French Pavilion.
The biennale brings together over 60 artists from the Mekong region, the Amazon, Africa, the Global Diaspora and beyond addressing global topics such as history, ethnicity, cross-border migration and ecologies.
On a research trip through Switzerland, Khanya Mashabela delved into the works of the two artists exhibiting at Kunsthalle Basel.
It's still C&10 and we retrieved another treasure from our archive: a conversation between John Akomfrah and Raimi Gbadamosi on the concept of hybridity - just on time with the opening of Akomfrah's first immersive exhibition in Germany.
The artist talks about her collage practice in relation to intuition and the meaning of a hybrid identity.
Artist, researcher, writer and founder, Senam Okudzeto receives on of the highest Swiss art prizes for her socio-politically relevant work.
In presenting a compelling interplay between reality, fiction and crisis, Lokko delivers a lesson on accountability for curatorial practices.
Following her debut solo exhibition, the artist reflects on Blackness, the gift of intuition, and the potency of African spirituality in her work.
Experimentation and exchange are the focus at Kemi Adeyemi’s arts writing incubator in Seattle.
Curators Onyịnye Alheri and Carolina Policarpo display collaborations between artists from Mozambique, Nigeria, and Angola.
Participating artist and writer Annie-Marie Akussah shares her views on the Biennale of Photography.
The distinguished author looks back on a year of turmoil: on coups, wars and embargos, but also on artistic connection with the world.
The Award enables a UK arts institution to present a solo exhibition by a woman artist who may not have received the recognition it deserves.
30 artists are shortlisted for the second edition of the art prize, which includes a cash prize and a solo exhibition at the Norval Foundation.
In 5 chapters and with 75 artists from the African world, the 13th Rencontres de Bamako will be held from December 8, 2022 to February 8, 2023.
The exhibition Globalisto: A Philosophy in Flux at MAMC+ shares observations on translocality and cultural hybridity.
C& author Costa Tshinzam has attended the second edition of a long-awaited biennial that has managed to put itself back on the world map of artistic events.
Sam Gilliam, one of the great innovators in postwar American painting, has passed away.
The project is a platform for artistic experimentation and new commissions connected to pan-African experiences.
With the national pavilion model, the Venice Biennale masquerades provincialism as worldliness. And it’s Global South artists who pay the price.
The curator and researcher features three Moroccan artists in her current exhibition who challenge monotone perspectives of their country.
Pioneering in sustainable architecture, Francis Kéré empowers and transforms communities through the process of his work.
As part of Pace’s global sales team, Drew will work with and support the gallery’s artists, develop strategies, exhibitions, and public programming.
AKB Stiftung and SAVVY Contemporary have teamed up to launch this new and long-term commission grant for artists of colour based in Germany.
The inspiring US-american writer and musician has passed away at the age of 64.
James sees herself as "advocate" for artists and starts her new role in Chicago early next year.
The multidisciplinary artist talks to Boitumelo Tlhoaele about a recent exhibition project and his Globalisto philosophy.
Crockett joins the New Museum from the Dallas Museum of Art (DMA) where she is The Nancy and Tim Hanley Assistant Curator of Contemporary Art. A specialist in Latinx art and art of the African diaspora, she curated the upcoming “Guadalupe Rosales: Drifting on a Memory” (October 1) and co-curated “Slip Zone: A New Look …
Contemporary And: On your canvases, there’s a freedom to your lines where the borders and boundaries of bodies are reimagined almost to the point of being rendered imaginary, inviting the characters to either stand out or become part of their environments, giving them an interesting autonomy over their presence in the work. It also invites …
Julia Grosse is a new associate curator at the Gropius Bau. Grosse is an art historian, critic and co-founder of the platform Contemporary And (C&) working on creating forms of accessibility across local and global contexts in the realm of contemporary art. Stephanie Rosenthal, Director of the Gropius Bau expresses her excitement for the decision. …
The PANAFEST web documentary focuses on four major Pan-African festivals of the 1960s and 70s: the First World Festival of Negro Arts (Dakar 1966), the First Pan-African Cultural Festival (Algiers 1969), Zaire74 (Kinshasa 1974) and Festac77 (Lagos 1977). 54 interviews recorded on three continents (Africa, North America, Europe) by a transdisciplinary team of researchers, interactive …
With Stacey Gillian Abe (Uganda), Njideka Akunyili, Crosby (Nigeria), Gabrielle Goliath (South Africa), Kudzanai-Violet Hwami (Zimbabwe), Keyezua (Angola), Lebohang Kganye (South Africa), Kapwani Kiwanga (Canada), Senzeni Marasela (South Africa), Grace Ndiritu (Kenya/United Kingdom), Wura-Natasha Ogunji (United States/Nigeria), Reinata, Sadimba (Mozambique), Lerato Shadi (South Africa), Ana Silva (Angola), Buhlebezwe Siwani (South Africa), Billie Zangewa (Malawi), Portia …
As a new wave of the COVID-19 pandemic paralyzes life in Kenya again, one art gallery is reaching out to locked-down audiences through art auctions on WhatsApp. In a pioneering initiative, the One Off Gallery in Nairobi held a live auction in March to raise money for the TNR Trust Nairobi, an animal charity providing …
The assemblages by Georges Adéagbo follow the life courses and fates of people using the traces they leave behind: objects and documents attest to encounters and individual decisions. By having craftsmen in Benin produce paintings and sculptures based on photos and printed items collected on his travels, the artist opens up new perspectives on the seemingly familiar …
For Frieze New York 2021, Okoyomon will present a performance-activated installation conceived specifically for The Shed. Extending their practice, Okoyomon’s work will aim to create what the artist describes as “a portal for a space of fragilization.” Convening poetry, sensory elements, sculpture, light, and sound, the work will celebrate self-expression and champion the value of …
The year 2020 was one many were glad to be rid of. For much of it the Senegalese art world struggled under the malaise of the ghost of the biennial that was not. The forced cancellation of Dak’art, the country’s biennale platform which has been a constant fixture in the international biennale calendar for close …
Amaryllis DeJesus Moleski concentrates on what we can feel but cannot see. Metallic iridescence and neon colors shimmer, illuminating a blueprint for survival that breathes life into ancient mythologies. Said the Rainbow to the Grave examines and alters our baseline, our symbols for what it means to be human. The rainbow is urgent, calling back …
In 2002 the artistic direction of the Kassel documenta was awarded for the first time to a “non-European”: Okwui Enwezor. A year before the opening he set up interdisciplinary platforms on four continents, with documenta 11 itself as the final platform. Enwezor’s goal was to produce a postcolonial exhibition whose artistic protagonists were to provide critical input from multiple perspectives on the contexts and issues of our globalized world.
1-54 Contemporary African Art Fair has announced 36 exhibitors from 17 countries participating in a new blended online and offline model for the upcoming London fair taking place 8-10 October 2020 (preview days on Thursday 8 and Friday 9 October). All exhibitors will showcase work at 1-54 Online Powered by Christie’s, with 29 exhibitors also …
“The problem was in the form of a question: in order to draw (was how it began), would one have to give up writing if to keep on writing one needed to draw—writing and drawing being identical gestures made with the hand—would to stop writing so as to draw make drawing impossible, since drawing was …
The exhibition There’s No Such Thing as Solid Ground features various installations and drawings that continue the Nigerian artist’s interest in the relationship between repair and care, body and territory, the movement of natural resources and people. Keeping a certain poetry in the form of text, sound and nature elements, Otobong Nkanga has unveiled a reworked …
Contemporary And: You describe some of the images that you use as “colonial images.” Is this to refer to a very specific time and place, or to any images created in a world that is not quite beyond colonialism? Frida Orupabo: When I speak of colonial images, I usually refer to photographs taken during the …
”A very, very short list of bail funds, freedom funds + mutual aid networks to support right now throughout the U.S. It is by no means comprehensive. We are following, learning from, and highlighting from sources such as It’s Going Down and The National Bail Fund Network. Please share, amplify, and if you have the …
What does it mean to be a woman in Algeria? That question has followed artist Amina Zoubir throughout her upbringing in the country, evolving to an essential orientation within her artistry through video, performance in public space, sculptures, drawings and installations. Growing up in the 1980s and the 90s, she witnessed a violent era of …
In 1964, French President Charles de Gaulle visited Martinique, Guadeloupe, and French Guiana on official state business. Flying over the Caribbean Sea, de Gaulle described the islands as “dust specks on the sea.” His quote evokes an otherworldly aerial view of the Caribbean archipelago, while also revealing a deep-seated hierarchical perspective of the region, stemming …
Contemporary And: How do you create a sense of belonging in Australia as a young woman of color? Is there a Black community where you grew up? Ivy Mutuku: My sense of belonging really began from my mum. When we migrated to Australia I was really young, and I never went back to Kenya until I …
Mobility in the arts, geographical or otherwise, is often seen as almost a requirement. However, COVID-19 has put to the test this very idea and aspiration. In the series "States of Mobility" we have selected texts that probe assumptions of movement in relation to people on the African continent and beyond. Here Emory Douglas, former Minister of Culture of the Black Panther Party and art director of the Black Panther newspaper, talks to C& about art, activism and collective self-determination.
Mobility in the arts, geographical or otherwise, is often seen as almost a requirement. However, COVID-19 has put to the test this very idea and aspiration. In the series "States of Mobility" we have selected texts that probe assumptions of movement in relation to people on the African continent and beyond. In “The passport that does not pass ports” Elliot Ross comments on the bourgeois myth that globalization has turned everybody into ultra-mobile cosmopolitans.
The number of artists from the African Diaspora who enjoy considerable success in the international art scene has rocketed in the past years. Many of these artists have also chosen to invest back on the continent by founding art projects from residencies to institutions. We highlight some of these in this series, Giving Back to the Continent. First in line is Bandjoun Art Station, initiated by Barthélémy Toguo and Germain Noubi in Cameroon in 2013. Esther Poppe spoke to the artists about the founding of a small-town art institution with a strong focus on working with the local population.
“Promises promised, not fulfilled” – Anthony Bumhira’s words during a dialogue with Erica de Greef, Jessica Hemmings, and Hayden Proud prophetically and tragically frame his passing. They were discussing the works of his that were featured in the recent Five Bhobh exhibition at Zeitz MOCAA. Reading through the transcript of this event (soon to …
Van der Heide will curate exhibitions for the Van Abbemuseum and contribute to the museum’s programme in which research, the collection, temporary activities, exhibitions, artistic practice and active collaboration with the public come together. She succeeds Annie Fletcher, who was appointed as director of the Irish Museum of Modern Art in Dublin at the beginning …
Bag Factory Artists’ Studios, in partnership with Strauss Education and Kalashnikovv Gallery announces Duduzile (DuduBloom) More as the winner of the prestigious Cassirer Welz Award. The other three finalists for this year were Boitumelo Motau, Khotso Motsoeneng and Thebe Phetogo. The winner of the award receives studio space at the Bag Factory Artists’ Studios, a …
Having previously held positions at Hayward Gallery, Turner Contemporary, International Foundation Manifesta, documenta 14, and most recently as Curator of Chicago Architecture Biennial 2019, Sepake brings a wealth of experience and knowledge to the organisation. Sepake joins Iniva during its 25th year, celebrated with a ground-breaking new project, Commission to Collect, which aims to transform …
Find here the open letter by SWEAT Find here the open letter by Gabi Ngcobo and her research team for Educational supplement On 26 September 2019 we reached out to Lesego Tlhwale, a representative of SWEAT, via a phone call which was meant to initiate a dialogue between us around the exhibition curated by …
Epheas Maposa’s artwork is driven by the words, fears, and expectations of his community. Yet the young artist paints a bigger picture: a hybrid space between Europe and Africa where techniques overlap and perspectives merge. He explores his ideas and techniques as a member of the Zimbabwean artist collective Village Unhu, and is currently showing his work at 31 project in Paris.
The Camera Austria Award for Contemporary Photography by the City of Graz, which is awarded biennially, will be bestowed on Lebohang Kganye (born 1990 in Katlehong, ZA) in 2019. The jury founded their decision to honour Lebohang Kganye with this award on the following statement: “Lebohang Kganye’s animated photography offers an inventive look into her …
In the post-war period, many pioneering Black artists were largely neglected by the Western art world despite their significant contributions, and persevered regardless. In the last ten years Western institutions have been waking up to these artists’ legacies. They are finally curating first retrospectives – and of course the markets have followed suit. In this series we chart their careers, highlighting their artistic evolutions and motivations in relation to the world around them. Multimedia artist Howardena Pindell has consistently defied biases in the New York art world since the 1970s, while also making art that has retained a timeless quality, writes Sabo Kpade.
C& will launch C& Artist’s Editions with a series of specially commissioned works by collaborating artists. For its first edition C& is thrilled to be working with acclaimed Paris-based artist Kapwani Kiwanga. C& will present a series of ten unique drawings by Kapwani Kiwanga, which reference the French colonial urbanist Hubert Lyautey’s proposition that a …
The Yale School of Art announces the appointment of Meleko Mokgosi as Associate Professor in Painting/Printmaking. Marta Kuzma, Stavros Niarchos Foundation Dean of the Yale School of Art notes: “As an artist and an educator, Meleko Mokgosi is dedicated to an expanded language of aesthetic and historical references while building on the necessary tools to …
C&AL is thrilled to be present with a booth in the media and magazine section at this year’s ARCOlisboa fair in Lisbon to present the print versions of C& and C& AL. The print issues are being launched twice a year always alongside a global art event, from the Dakar Biennale to the documenta or …
As part of the promotional campaign for the 500th anniversary of the city of Havana, the 13th Havana Biennial – as a product of international cultural tourism – offers visitors an optimistic experience: a celebratory atmosphere marked by an influx of new ideas, the circulation of people from abroad and a feeling of well-being in …
“It is from the body, not the mind, that questions arise and are explored.” This is the excerpt from Walter Mignolo’s The Darker Side of Western Modernity (2011) that Kiluanji Kia Henda evokes in his latest series of photographs. The series’ aim is to expose urban exclusion and the drive to expand the urbanization of …
In our latest series – Female Pioneers – we look at female artists from Africa who have made great contributions to art on the continent. Here our author Khanya Mashabela reflects on the oeuvre of Gladys Mgudlandlu, who is recognized as a pioneer painter in South Africa: She was one of the first Black women in the country to enter the predominently white art world in the 1960s.
In many traditional African societies, clay pots and vessels are made by women. Shaped by hand, decorated or not, they fulfill mostly domestic needs and are used to collect and keep water or beer, to cook in and to eat from. Because these items are functional household items they fall in that murky category of …
Nominated unanimously by the International Finding Committee the Supervisory Board appointed ruangrupa, a collective of artists and creatives from Jakarta, Indonesia, with a ten-member core as the artistic direction of documenta 15. This was announced by the general director of documenta und Museum Fridericianum gGmbH, Dr. Sabine Schormann, today. The Indonesian word ruangrupa loosely translates …
In 2007 the Johannesburg Art Gallery (JAG) had a record number of visitors. During the three months the exhibition Africa Remix. Contemporary Art of a Continent was on show, 28,000 guests were registered. Simon Njami, the exhibition’s curator, collaborated with an international team of curators to conceptualize an overview of contemporary art production on the …
Following the August 2018 appointment by Manifesta 13 of Dutch architect Winy Maas and urban practice MVRDV to conduct the pre-biennial research study for the city of Marseille, a new artistic team has been selected for Manifesta 13 Marseille in 2020 by Director of Manifesta, Hedwig Fijen. Manifesta 13 Marseille will apply the same innovative …
Redrafting the image of Zimbabwe – from colonization to political-constitutional decolonization and independence in 1980 – was the driving force of the guerilla movements that emerged in the course of the liberation struggles. An overview of women’s involvement in Zimbabwean history, in the anti-colonial struggle and the African nationalist movements, provides the backdrop for a …
Entitled Affective Affinities, the 33rd Bienal de São Paulo aims to focus the artists’ gaze on their own creative contexts as a way to explore an alternative to thematic exhibitions. The Biennial’s curator Gabriel Pérez-Barreiro has invited seven artist-curators one of whom being Wura-Natasha Ogunji. Will Furtado spoke to the artist-curator to discuss her curatorial …
Contemporary And: Édouard Glissant’s notion of opacity plays an integral part in your current exhibition. How can the Black subject deal with the idea of ridding oneself of the burden of transparency? Nikita Gale: I’m at a point in my practice where I’m circulating between two different manifestations of opacity: I’m invoking it by responding …
Referring to the title of this very same exhibition at the NGBK in Berlin, Laboratorium der Solidarität introduced here, our series focuses on solidarity movements. Because at this very moment we are experiencing an entire global movement calling for solidarity. In a time of uncertainty, people all over the world are prepared to act jointly. People are in solidarity …
In our ongoing series of round-table discussions we ask a selection of artists and art practitioners to answer a set of questions on a specific topic. This time around the theme is “identity” and here C&'s deputy editor Will Furtado talked to Meleko Mokgosi.
Les Ateliers Sahm is a center started by Congolese visual artist Bill Kouélany. Based in Brazzaville, this organization is one of the rare local initiatives outside of the Institut Français to offer cultural programs. In 2014 Les Ateliers Sahm launched an exhibition presenting a selection of works by young artists as part of the Dakar …
In Lubumbashi, a city in the southeast of DR Congo, there is an artistic expertise that is unacknowledged or, as is often the case, not fully appreciated. The work of Fundi Mwamba (FM) Gustave Giresse is an eloquent illustration of this. A passionate story-teller, this young artist launched himself in cartoons and various other media …
In both the exhibition and the book, The Axé Bahia collection of images, artifacts and music is a celebration of the African influences within Brazilian culture. There are almost three million people living in Salvador, the capital of the state Bahia. The majority of that population is drawn from people of color—ranging from people of …
From the New Museum Triennial’s Songs for Sabotage to the Triennial of Photography Hamburg’s Breaking Point, art institutions today are striving to inspire social and political action. Often this desire can translate into ambiguous and abstract concepts, or even backfire. So how can art be the change in a tangible way? This was one of the concerns addressed in this year’s March Meeting at Sharjah Art Foundation (SAF) in the UAE.
Sotheby’s announced that an intergenerational group of prominent artists with close ties to the mission and history of The Studio Museum in Harlem will donate important works for auction this May at Sotheby’s New York to benefit the institution. Artists including Njideka Akunyili Crosby, Mark Bradford, Sam Gilliam, Rashid Johnson, Glenn Ligon, Julie Mehretu, Lorna …
Dagara Dakin: What would you say is the inspiration behind your artistic calling? Jean David Nkot: As the saying goes, we don’t choose art; art chooses us. Things happened quite naturally and it was out of pure passion that I embraced this work. It has been a great help in my life, which wasn’t at …
C&: You recently relocated from Cape Town to Johannesburg. To what extent does this move influence your personal and artistic practice? How would you describe both art scenes? Bronwyn Katz: I had been based in Cape Town for the last five years, mainly due to my studies at the University of Cape Town. Space and …
The exhibitions, both permanent and temporary, mounted by this contemporary art gallery, which is located in the western part of Cameroon, open a window on the works of renowned visual artists from Europe like David Hockney and David Nash from the UK, Stephan Balkenhol from Germany, or indeed the French artists Peggy Viallat-Langlois and ORLAN. …
The exhibition features 18 artists from eight different African countries and includes work by two Afro-Brazilian artists, Arjan Martins and Dalton Paula. Ex África brings together video art, photography, installations, music, performance, etc. across four themes: echos of history, bodies and portraits, urban drama, and musical explosions. In the center’s inner courtyard, the work Non Orientable Paradise …
C&: What drew you to the memories of your mother’s childhood home in Jamaica? Jamilah Sabur: I have been documenting memories from both my parents and an aunt, and some of their memories have inspired past works. But through my mom’s retelling of memories, I am compelled to trace and connect them to significant historical …
Elsa Guily: Pokój is an installation made from organic materials designed to cultivate a relationship with others through food; the interior of this room refers to the inside of the body. Nourishing oneself by feeding on others as a means to structure one’s being is one of the underlying issues this work addresses to visitors—can …
Aïcha Diallo: You are the Founding Director and one of the artistic members of the ongoing project Wood Land School, along with Tanya Lukin Linklater and cheyanne turions. How did this project all start? Duane Linklater: I started the project Wood Land School in 2011 in my studio located at Nipissing First Nations in northern …
The Biennale de l’Art Africain Contemporain Dak’Art / Biennial of Contemporary African Art Dak’art announced the guest curators for it’s 13th edition in 2018 titled ‘The Red Hour’. Alongside Simon Njami, who returns as the artistic director , the Dak’Art has invited Elvira Dyangani Ose, Marisol Rodriguez, Bonaventure Soh Bejeng Ndikung , Alya Sebti and Hou …
In a studio outside of Cape Town, photographer Nico Krijno refashions sculpture and performance.
The group, made up of creatives (Christopher Udemezue, Jahmal B. Golden, Maya Mones, Paul Anthony Smith, Renée Stout, Tau Lewis,Joey De Jesus, and Shanekia McIntosh) from the Afro-Caribbean Diaspora, examines themes around solidarity, community, queerness and spirituality across a broad range of disciplines. Magnus Rosengarten: RAGGA NYC’s artists create in various media. How did this …
In the series Curriculum of Connections, we bring together critical voices, ideas, and projects working towards educational, artistic, and research practices. In this space, we learn, unlearn, and co-investigate old and new territories of knowledge systems, collaborations, and imagination. These are three ways in which the students who participated in the 1976 Soweto Uprising have …
The Armory Show named curators for its Focus and Platform sections and also announced a new curatorial leadership summit for its 2018 fair. Bringing together an international roster of prominent curators, the daylong summit is designed to foster “new ideas and developments within the curatorial landscape.” Naomi Beckwith, curator at the Museum of Contemporary Art …
The exhibition “Kolmanskop Dream” opens the curatorial season Untie to tie, initiated by Alya Sebti, which explores the intersections between artistic and social discourses linked to colonial structures in contemporary realities. This first chapter pays tribute to the tout-monde philosophy of the poet and philosopher Édouard Glissant. In his work Glissant endeavored to rethink globalization …
With the exception of the 2015 Venice Biennale curated by Nigerian-born Okwui Enwezor, who included a record number of African artists in his themed exhibition, Africa’s presence at the Venice Biennale has been mostly a narrative of absence and underrepresentation, often accompanied by non-official attempts by African curators and scholars to put the record straight. …
With just a few days to go before the 57th Biennale opens, all eyes are on Venice. This year’s exhibition, themed Viva Arte Viva, is curated by Christine Macel and will be running from 13 May through 26 November 2017. Given that the Kenyan Pavilion had been previously dominated by non-Kenyan artists, this is going …
From Thursday to Sunday, 47 galleries all over Berlin are opening their doors to collectors, buyers and contemporary art lovers. HERE ARE 10 IDEAS WHERE TO GO: . Status Quo Vadis? Panel discussion on cultural practices beyond “the global arts quota” Thursday, April 27th, 6-8pm, at ACUD MACHT NEU, Veteranenstraße 21, 10119 In the context of their year long …
The following 25 artists were selected by the CAP Prize panel of judges comprising 20 international curators, editors, publishers and artists, from hundreds of applications for the CAP Prize 2017. Five of them have the chance to be awarded with the sixth Prize for Contemporary African Photography to be announced in June 2017. Mohamed Altoum – Born …
documenta 14 is founded on several important institutional partnerships in Athens and Kassel. Each of these individual relationships with institutions—and the people who make them work—results in specific programming, research, and collaborative projects. Working together with partner institutions, documenta 14 points to a public sphere that is non-exclusionary and defined by encounters and possibilities—a public …
The Armory Show announced that its new $10,000 Presents Booth Prize – awarded by jury to a young gallery exhibiting in that sector of the fair – goes to Mariane Ibrahim Gallery of Seattle, for a solo stand of multimedia works by Zohra Opoku. A German-Ghanaian artist living in Accra, Opoku plays on the symbolic …
FNB JoburgArtFair is delighted to announce Robin Rhode as the 2017 Featured Artist. Rhode was born in 1976 in Cape Town and currently lives and works in Berlin. He has had major solo museum shows at the Drawing Center, NYC; Kulturhuset Stadsteatern, Stockholm; Kunstmuseum Luzern, Switzerland; National Gallery of Victoria, Melbourne; Los Angeles County Museum …
. In the film Living Labour – presented during the 6th Marrakech Biennale – Bouchra Khalili ponders the act of speech as a gesture of resistance. Poised between the poetic and the political, Khalili’s work leads us to question the role of subjectivity in assertions of an egalitarian community. . Elsa Guily: Living Labour is …
. C&: You are the curator of the show With Different Eyes which is currently on view at the ifa Gallery Berlin. What inspired you to work with photographer Johannes Haile? Meskerem Assegued: I grew up with Johannes Haile and his photographs. He was close to my father and we visited one another’s homes often. …
Referring to the title of an exhibition at the NGBK in Berlin, “Laboratorium der Solidarität” we want to start our new series, focusing on solidarity movements. Because at this very moment we are experiencing an entire global movement calling for solidarity. In a time of uncertainty, people all over the world are prepared to act jointly. …
AKAA – Also Known As Africa is the first art fair devoted to contemporary art and design from Africa that was held in Paris, November 11-13, 2016, at the Carreau du Temple in parallel with a Parisian cultural calendar that features photography in its spotlight. . . . . . .
Derrick Adams has been awarded the $50,000 Joyce Alexander Wein Artist Prize by New York’s Studio Museum in Harlem. Adams is a multidisciplinary artist making performance, photography, video, sound works, sculpture, and works on paper. He exhibited at MoMA PS1 in 2005 as part of Greater New York 2005 and has appeared in three editions …
So far, the issue of Dadaism and Africa has been ignored by the European public, although in the media it has been stylized as a “new discovery”. The exhibition’s title, however, DADA Afrika – Dialog mit dem Fremden (DADA Africa – dialogue with the other) signifies a conservative approach and that Dadaists were far …
The 12th Tollman Award for the Visual Arts has been awarded to young South African artist Simphiwe Ndzube Ndzube was born in 1990 in Gauteng and grew up in Hofmeyre and Cape Town. He graduated with a BA Fine Art in 2015 at the Michaelis School of Fine Art, University of Cape Town where he …
READ THE COMPLETE VERSION HERE! . Our latest C& print issue focuses on Afro-Brazilian perspectives as well as the 32nd Bienal de São Paulo, which is starting this week is a premiere: We are especially happy to be co-editing this edition with the amazing São Paulo-based editorial team of cultural magazine OMenelick 2° Ato. Over two years …
What a blessing to be present at the discussion in the Academy of Fine Arts (ABA) in Kinshasa! – To discuss a number of topics during the symposium, especially how to effectively integrate contemporary practices of art into the curriculum. As Patrick Misasi, the Director General of the Academy, said in his opening speech, …
C&: Please give us an introduction to the publications O Menelick 2ºAto and A Presença Negra. Alexandre Araujo Bispo: Whereas O Menelick 2ºAto is a publication, A Presença Negra (The Black Presence) is a political collective action aimed at inviting Black artists and the general Black public to be present in spaces that historically …
As part of our Biennale-short-series Sabrina Moura sets the scene in her discussion of the Biennales in Dakar and Havana
The 12th edition of the Dak’Art “The City in the Blue (La Cité dans le jour bleu)“ is curated by Simon Njami
Still (the) Barbarians is curated by Koyo Kouoh, the founding artistic director of RAW Material Company, Dakar and the curator of 1:54 Contemporary African Art Fair in London and New York and on view until 17 July. . . . . . . . . . . . . find more about the exhibition HERE
While exploring the question of visibility through Georges Bataille’s notion of formlessness (L’Informe), Maheke refers to the dance club by turning the white rooms of the gallery into a vibrating space within which dance and music operate as means of resistance and gestures of remembrance. . . . . . . find exhibition infos: HERE
Addis Fine Art is a new gallery space in the Ethiopian capital Addis Ababa that was established to cater to the growing public interest and participation in the country’s visual arts C&: Congratulations on launching the gallery Addis Fine Art in January 2016. How would you describe AFA? Addis Fine Art: The gallery is the culmination …
Bukola Oye: What is the Vernacular Art Laboratory about? Aderemi Adegbite: Vernacular Art Laboratory (VAL, Lagos) is a nonprofit artist initiative I founded in 2015 in Lagos. It is a space that artists co-habit to exchange ideas and co-create works with uncommon flair. As a noncommercial art space, collaboration between contemporary visual artists …
In Alia Swastika, Biennale Jogja selected one of Indonesia’s most remarkable young curators to be its new director in October 2014. After the country’s transition to democracy, the 35-year-old communications graduate played a decisive part in reviving the conversation on contemporary Indonesian art and culture. In 2005, as part of an exchange program, she …
Notwithstanding my intellectual distrust of essentialisms and my bent for postcolonial skepticism, I am struck by a certain “look” the minute I walk into Beauté Congo. It’s not quite “le look Africain” or anything so grandly patronizing, but I am aware of what the curator of the exhibition André Magnin has described in the catalogue as …
EX NUNC is a curatorial and editorial project that aims to map, analyse and question the theory and practice of performance art and performativity. EX NUNC occupies both an on-line and off-line dimension; the former is represented by the website, which is structured as a polyhedral platform for presentation of meaningful material, the latter consists …
Kara Walker has been named Tepper Chair in Visual Arts at the Mason Gross School of the Arts. Her five-year term commences fall 2015, centered on research and collaboration with graduate and undergraduate students. Walker follows Catherine Murphy as the second holder of the fully endowed Tepper Chair in Visual Arts at Mason Gross. This position, …
Following on directly from the exhibition Haïti, deux siècles de création artistique [Haiti, two centuries of artistic creation], recently shown at the Grand Palais in Paris, the Centre Georges Pompidou presented a retrospective until May 18 of the work of Hervé Télémaque, a French painter of Haitian origin. The exhibition will run at the Musée …
Malawi-born, London-based conceptual artist Samson Kambalu on the aesthetic spirit of play at this year’s Venice Biennale. Reviews for All the World’s Futures are mostly confused. Some say the show is too difficult to get into, others postulate that it lacks a center of gravity to draw everything together. It is perhaps too subtle and …
Clemens Bomsdorf: Your exhibition venue is called CAMP (Center for Art on Migration Politics) and displays art by refugees. At first, that smacks of political correctness or starry-eyed idealism. How do you intend for the center to contribute to the debate and to art in general? Tone Olaf Nielsen: The artists that exhibit their work …
El Anatsui is the recipient of the Golden Lion for Lifetime Achievement of the 56th International Art Exhibition of the Biennale di Venezia – All the World’s Futures. The decision was made by the Board of Directors of la Biennale chaired by Paolo Baratta, upon recommendation of the Curator of the 56th International Art Exhibition Okwui …
“Whose voices represent half of the world’s population?” asks cultural journalist Missla Libsekal in Another Africa’s 89plus interview series. “Those born in 1989 and later.” Her statement, which forms part of the introduction to the web based magazine’s interview series is an appropriate reminder of the momentous significance of what she terms “digital natives” …
“The steel buildings tower above us like a giant skeleton so enigmatic that one wonders whether the city ever truly existed or whether this was nothing but a raving poet’s description of a mirage in his struggle to survive in the desert.” (1) The discovery of a sign in the Namib desert bearing the inscription …
“Man fears being engulfed by this mass of words. To safeguard his freedom, he builds fortresses..1” In October 2012, the Portuguese government launched a “golden visa” program, enabling wealthy foreign investors to receive residency permits for Portugal. The investors obtain access to the European Union in exchange for spending sizable sums in the country. The …
When the contemporary art project KLA ART 014 enters the festival phase in October, a month-long and extensive period of activities will reach its peak. The event goes public with three elements under the theme UNMAPPED: an exhibition at Kampala Railway Station, the Boda Boda Project, and an Artists’ Studios tour. The KLA ART 014’s …
Upon entering the Ifa Galerie in Berlin, we are confronted with a strange mess of objects: The Jealous Lover, a site-specific installation by artist Moshekwa Langa, shown as part of the series of exhibitions “Solo For…” organized by the institute. Resembling the debris left in a playroom by a horde of children, the installation at first …
Echoes – Fragments is the title of a group of twenty images that photographer Malala Andrialavidrazana presented at the festival Itinéraires des Photographes Voyageurs held from 1st to 30th April 2014 at Espace MC2A in Bordeaux. Andrialavidrazana’s photographs are part of a larger series titled Echoes (from Indian Ocean), in which the artist has tried …
C&: How did you start out on your professional/artistic adventure inDakar? Mauro Petroni : It began in the 1980s. It was a cocktail of adventure and discovery, a desire to make things happen… There was no contact at all between the different cultures, so every step that allowed us to get in touch with each …
The numbers alone are undeniable: with sixty percent of its population comprised of blacks and pardos, Brazil is the second most populous African country, after Nigeria. According to the most updated research on slavevoyages.org, a total of 3,800,000 Africans were brought to Brazil, which is more than ten times the number of arrivals to the …
On Monday, 10 February 2014, Stuart McPhail Hall, sociologist, cultural theorist, philosopher, teacher, husband and father, died age 82. In the near century since his birth in Kingston, Jamaica, he left an indelible mark on British intellectual life. His most extraordinary achievement was in mounting a sustained and successful challenge to entrenched, retrograde notions of …
For the last ten years, the Luanda Triennial, the biggest international art event in the Angolan capital, marked the art scene in Luanda. The event, designed by Fernando Alvim, had its first edition in 2007 but for the previous five years several small events took place in order to prepare the momentum and gather support for …
The oil-rich country of Angola, which is participating in the 55th edition of the Venice Biennale for the first time, has been awarded the prestigious Golden Lion for the best pavilion.
I met Ato Malinda for the first time in 2009 – one of Kenya’s first performance artists within the art gallery space. She had just arrived in Kenya from the United States where she studied art history. Our meeting in Nairobi was not coincidental as I was at the time leaving for the UK to …
