Toronto’s Afrofuture
Toronto lends itself to sci-fi imaginings, so it’s not surprising that for some it could be a capital of Afrofuturism.
Art
The Congolization Movement
Creating spaces where artists related to the Congolese diaspora can freely tell their side of the story.
John Akomfrah, Stuart Hall and the Film Essay
Akomfrah's films gives voice to the legacy of the African diaspora in Europe, and his experimental approach to narrative and structure helped pave the way for the re-emergence of the "essay film" today.
To be an artist in Egypt right now
An Egyptian theater company puts on Victor Hugo’s Les Misérables in colloquial Arabic. The choice was no error.
Lagos in the Red
A short documentary film on the Lagos, Nigeria, performance artist Jelili Atiku.
The Book of North African Literature
Pierre Joris and Habib Tengou edit a book about the multiple beginnings, traditions and genealogies in the literatures of the many languages of the region, and the region's diasporas.
Wangechi Mutu in conversation with Trevor Schoonmaker
Schoonmaker: When did you start to see work by African artists that you did respond to?
Three Signs of Ghana’s Art Times
Ghana is currently experiencing a surge of contemporary performing and visual arts. Here are some notes
Confronting Afrikaners’ cultural masochism
The frustration or inability to establish an identity that is free of hegemonic constructed myth – that ceases to be at odds with current reality.
Looking beyond beauty
An interview with the artist Lalla Essaydi who seeks to challenge Orientalist mythology in her work.
Golden Lions
A conversation with the curators of the Angolan Pavilion at the 2013 Venice Biennale.
Futuristic Folklore
Considering James Town's weighty history, which played a huge part in shaping Ghana, it seems only right that when re-imagining a future Accra we start at the place where the city began.
Zambian skull (plus Zambian guide) in a London art gallery
The Thai-born artist, Pratchaya Phinthong, mines Zambia's colonial history to explore how historical narratives are performed through objects.
The noises of Lagos
Emeka Ogboh's experimental videos and soundscapes of Lagos, Nigeria.
When Basquiat went to Africa
In 1988, Basquiat traveled to Cote d'Ivoire, anticipating "very unsophisticated" Africans would see his art. That's not what happened.
Hassan Khan and his 6 minute film “Jewel”
Last year, while visiting Okwui Enwezor’s Triennale at the Palais de Tokyo in Paris (titled: “Intense
The Unruly Rush of the City
Julie Mehretu's canvases depict a public zone dichotomous to that of their own surrounding, brimming with a sense of the life of a city which we can never really know or measure, whose politics is alive but oddly incubated.
An environmental calamity
The South African photographer Gideon Mendel's images of people affected by flooding in seven sites, including Nigeria.
Angola’s Biennale
It is hard to find critics asking what Angolan artist Edson Chagas’s work does, the context through which it was produced, or the social conditions it draws attention to.
Your truths are self-evident. Ours are a mystery
In her work, Ellen Gallagher defiantly challenges linear perspective to redress what fellow African-American artist Theaster Gates has called "the African non-archive."