Africa Is a Country

Video: Interview with artist Thando Mama

Africa Is a Country Podcast
African Five-a-Side Podcast

Video: Interview with artist Thando Mama

By
Sean Jacobs

[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-GWdGfKXK3U&w=500&h=307]

A 9-minute excerpt from a new short video documentary (20 minutes in all) about the South African artist Thando Mama. (The film is directed by German filmmakers Thorolf Lipp and Tobias Wendl. The bulk of Lipp and Wendl’s film work focuses on African subjects; check out their Youtube page.)

If you’re unfamiliar with Mama’s work, for both his own description as well as that of critics, see here, here and here.

* And if you’re around New York City, Mama’s media art is on show as part of “Second Coming,” an exhibition organized by curators Gabi Ngcobo, Carlos Palacios and Andrea Torreblanca, at Bard College’s Center for Curatorial Studies until May 23.

Further Reading

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The sound of revolt

On his third album, Afro-Portuguese artist Scúru Fitchádu fuses ancestral wisdom with urban revolt, turning memory and militancy into a soundtrack for resistance.

O som da revolta

No seu terceiro álbum, o artista afro-português Scúru Fitchádu funde a sabedoria ancestral com a revolta urbana, transformando memória e militância em uma trilha sonora para a resistência.

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From Cornell to conscience

Hounded out of the United States for his pro-Palestine activism, Momodou Taal insists that the struggle is global, drawing strength from Malcolm X, faith, and solidarity across borders.

After the uprising

Following two years of mass protest, Kenya stands at a crossroads. A new generation of organizers is confronting an old question: how do you turn revolt into lasting change? Sungu Oyoo joins the AIAC podcast to discuss the vision of Kenya’s radical left.

Redrawing liberation

From Gaza to Africa, colonial cartography has turned land into property and people into populations to be managed. True liberation means dismantling this order, not redrawing its lines.

Who deserves the city?

Colonial urbanism cast African neighborhoods as chaotic, unplanned, and undesirable. In postcolonial Dar es Salaam, that legacy still shapes who builds, who belongs, and what the middle class fears the city becoming.