In this online live event, Rose Wambui Kamande, Odilia Anyachi Okonga, Vamba Sherif and Rahab Njeri will discuss life and work, especially his latest work, The Perfect Nine with the Kenyan giant world literature. Ngugi's influence is indisputable. The continent of Africa and the entire world is proud to have him in their midst. He continues to extend the boundaries of literature and to emphasise the importance of native languages in the evolution of cultures. The conversation will take place on...
In this online live event, Rose Wambui Kamande, Odilia Anyachi Okonga, Vamba Sherif and Rahab Njeri will discuss life and work, especially his latest...
No others, same time in African Cosmologies. Photography, Time, and the Other. It is a beautifully produced book. The enticing image, Four Twins , by the late Nigerian artist Rotimi Fani-Kayode , overlaid by the imprinted title African Cosmologies , enhanced with titian metallic foil, creates an attractive case bound cover. Closed, the book triggers a sense of anticipation and curiosity that the click of an eBook simply cannot deliver. On opening this work it becomes immediately obvious that the...
No others, same time in African Cosmologies. Photography, Time, and the Other. It is a beautifully produced book. The enticing image, Four Twins , by the...
As a second-generation Ghanaian diasporan born and bred in the Netherlands the work of James Barnor intrigues me in several ways. Certainly, because it gives me a glimpse of Ghanaian history, yet what stands out most are the photographs of Ghanaian women, which he captured in all their glory. Their poses, their attire, their hairstyles and the backdrop of the pictures, depicting a reality different than the status quo, allows me to imagine how the uniqueness of womanhood has travelled through space...
As a second-generation Ghanaian diasporan born and bred in the Netherlands the work of James Barnor intrigues me in several ways. Certainly, because it...
The djelis took cultures and traditions across the African continent and even the world. They even resonate in the works of rappers and spoken word artists. In his seminal work, The Guardian of the Word , Guinean novelist Camara Laye explored the work of Djeli’s in several countries in West Africa. Laye focused on his own people, the Mandé, who are spread across Liberia, Sierra Leone, Guinea, Ivory Coast, Senegal, Gambia, Burkina Faso, Ghana and Mali. In fact, many of the people of Sierra Leone,...
The djelis took cultures and traditions across the African continent and even the world. They even resonate in the works of rappers and spoken word...
Win een exemplaar van Nadia Owusu's spraakmakende memoir. Als Nadia twee is, laat haar Armeens-Amerikaanse moeder hun gezin in de steek. Nadia blijft achter met haar kleine zusje en hun Ghanese vader, die als ambtenaar bij de VN werkt. Ze bewonen plekken over de hele wereld: Rome, Dar es Salaam, Kumasi en Londen. Nadia spreekt meerdere talen en heeft meerdere thuislanden. Ze vraagt zich af of ze Europees, Afrikaans of Amerikaans is. Of niets van dat alles? Als haar vader overlijdt, voelt Nadia zich...
Win een exemplaar van Nadia Owusu's spraakmakende memoir. Als Nadia twee is, laat haar Armeens-Amerikaanse moeder hun gezin in de steek. Nadia blijft...
Germany made a first step. However, ‘we need to break down the institutional inertia’, the Nigerian Ambassador to the country argues. Much has been written and said of late about the Benin Bronzes and Africa’s struggle for restitution of its stolen cultural properties in general. As one of the interlocutors who has helped to revitalise this longstanding issue that continues to trigger curiosity and capture public attention, I feel obliged to share my perspective on the long struggle for the...
Germany made a first step. However, ‘we need to break down the institutional inertia’, the Nigerian Ambassador to the country argues. Much has been...
This year’s online edition of Movies that Matter features at least four films of interest to our readership. Paradise Desert This is a world premiere! Filmmaker Ike Bertels takes us to a prosperous and happy diamond town in the south of Namibia that is forced to think about its future now that the mines are all emptied. Will the remaining inhabitants be able to turn the town around? This is an observational documentary which lets the townspeople and the stunning landscape speak for themselves. The...
This year’s online edition of Movies that Matter features at least four films of interest to our readership. Paradise Desert This is a world premiere!...
This year’s Annual NIAS talks about violent and imagined pasts, and how can we make amends with it. With Jennifer Tosch, Femke Halsema and Christophe Bertossi. When we talk about the history of a country or a city, whose history are we talking about? Due to mobilizations such as Black Lives Matter, dominant narratives have become publicly contested; contested to include stories which were left forgotten. But if we talk about a shared history, such a normative history has to go beyond only including...
This year’s Annual NIAS talks about violent and imagined pasts, and how can we make amends with it. With Jennifer Tosch, Femke Halsema and Christophe...
A conversation with the UCT's Dr. Divine Fuh on the impact of the recently destroyed archives. Last weekend, a fire destroyed part of the university's library. In addition to some historic buildings, part of the precious collection was lost. The library contains tens of thousands of valuable documents, books, sound recordings and more. This includes an impressive collection of African sources, including some from the 16th century. The collection includes 65 000 books, 26 000 pamphlets, 3 000...
A conversation with the UCT's Dr. Divine Fuh on the impact of the recently destroyed archives. Last weekend, a fire destroyed part of the university's...
This group show investigates everyday objects and aspects of our daily lives that inspire the emergence of creativity —as well as the unexpected mediums that serve as canvases. Including artworks that are derived from, or stand in place of, everyday utilitarian objects, the exhibition includes such unlikely mediums as walking-sticks, motorbikes, ceramic tableware, and unique couture. Featuring Nyambo MasaMara, Laylaa Jacobs, Kevin Collins, Razia Myers, Hanna Noor Mohamed, Jeanius Exchange, Petrus...
This group show investigates everyday objects and aspects of our daily lives that inspire the emergence of creativity —as well as the unexpected mediums...
In her first solo exhibition, Lola Keyezua (1988, Angola) explores the sexuality of the elderly by focusing on social, cultural and religious influences. After showing one of the photographs in the Amsterdam Galerie Bart group exhibition The Great Photography Special , last year, it was decided to present the whole series of ‘Never Too Old To Cut The Banana When Erected’ in the gallery. After graduating at the Royal Academy in The Hague in 2014, Keyezua returned to Luanda, where she lived from 2015...
In her first solo exhibition, Lola Keyezua (1988, Angola) explores the sexuality of the elderly by focusing on social, cultural and religious influences....
Reports from the University of Cape Town have revealed that the entire contents of the Jagger Reading Room, along with six other buildings, were destroyed by the fire that swept through Table Mountain last week. According to a statement released by UCT, the fire destroyed the galleries, adjacent stores, and offices and gutted the roof of the Jagger Reading Room. The archival and published collections stored in the Reading Room were destroyed. This includes most of the African Studies published...
Reports from the University of Cape Town have revealed that the entire contents of the Jagger Reading Room, along with six other buildings, were...
In conversation with Dr. Divine Fuh about the recent burning down of the University of Cape Town’s library. In an online Studio ZAM lunch time on Monday 26 April, 2021, the social anthropologist and director of the Institute for Humanities in Africa at UCT spoke about loss and solidarity with efforts to build what has been destroyed. Fuh has also been a visiting fellow at the Africa Study Centre and was involved in Langa Research and Publishing as well as the African Boon Collective. That Day “On...
In conversation with Dr. Divine Fuh about the recent burning down of the University of Cape Town’s library. In an online Studio ZAM lunch time on Monday...
I am writing to give you an update on the process of restoring the property of the University of Cape Town (UCT). After any event as traumatic as the #UCTFire, it is common for people to speculate and even unwittingly spread false reports about the extent of the damage, the cause of the crisis and the long-term outlook for recovery. This is especially common after a fire, because the affected buildings often cannot be entered immediately. Investigators and building professionals need time to assess...
I am writing to give you an update on the process of restoring the property of the University of Cape Town (UCT). After any event as traumatic as the...
No one goes to Paradise to return from it. There is a pivotal moment in the great Mandé epic Sundiata , when Sundiata Keita, alias The Lion King, is forced to leave, to migrate. At this point, he is a young man, full of unbridled ambitions and possibilities. For the first time in his life, despite his obvious limp and speech difficulties, despite all the obstacles stacked against him, he is fully aware of his own powers. This event takes place sometime in the 13 th century and the world as we know...
No one goes to Paradise to return from it. There is a pivotal moment in the great Mandé epic Sundiata , when Sundiata Keita, alias The Lion King, is...
Here are the 25 photographers, selected by a panel of 21 international judges, making the shortlist of the 10 th edition of CAP: Aàdesokan | Yetunde | Ayeni-Babaeko | Thami Benkirane | Marcus Trappaud Bjørn | Nabil Boutros | Katel Delia | Justin Dingwall | Andrew Esiebo | Jason Florio | Pippa Hetherington | Brian Hodges | Eldin Zainab Imad | Matt Kay | Adil Kourkouni | Tamary Kudita | DeLovie Kwagala | Dillon Marsh | Fabrice Monteiro | Claudia Ndebele | Emeke Obanor | Joseph Obanubi | Léonard...
Here are the 25 photographers, selected by a panel of 21 international judges, making the shortlist of the 10 th edition of CAP: Aàdesokan | Yetunde |...
Andrea Stultiens' breathing photographs, a hypnotising re-figuration of colonial imagery. Breathing photographs. That's Andrea Stultiens' fascinating invention. Stultiens, photographer, artist and researcher, came up with the concept while working on the collection of still images, films and written notes of Dr. Paul Julien (1901-2001), explorer and amateur anthropologist. Over the past 20 years or so, she has worked with photography archives, mainly on Uganda. Always in relation to the imaging of...
Andrea Stultiens' breathing photographs, a hypnotising re-figuration of colonial imagery. Breathing photographs. That's Andrea Stultiens' fascinating...
'As an Ethiopian I do not have a duty to focus my lens on suffering alone', the Ethiopian photographer says. Tsegaye graduated in painting from the Addis Ababa University School of Fine Arts and Design in 2002, but gave up painting when he developed an allergy to oil paint. He then found his real passion in photography and has turned this into a profession, and moreover into a way of expressing a very particular voice. 'As a photographer I try as much as possible to escape being pigeonholed. This...
'As an Ethiopian I do not have a duty to focus my lens on suffering alone', the Ethiopian photographer says. Tsegaye graduated in painting from the Addis...
Traces of colonialism are often hidden in plain sight and continue to have a conscious or unconscious effect in today’s society. In this project/exhibition the traces are a school building, a park, imperialist myths, but also the presence of people with African roots (who are) born in Belgium. Fifteen international artists inhabit the imaginary city, Congoville ,where they guide the visitor over the Middelheim site. They walk as ‘black flâneurs’ through the present and history and guide us in a...
Traces of colonialism are often hidden in plain sight and continue to have a conscious or unconscious effect in today’s society. In this...
The film Message from Mukalap captures a unique sound recording from 1936 in the now extinct Khoe language !ora. It will be screened at the upcoming International Film Festival in Rotterdam, the Netherlands. At the core of the film Message from Mukalap lies a unique sound recording that captures a spoken message from a man named Mukalap. It was recorded around 1936 in South Africa. Mukalap speaks in the now extinct Khoe language !ora. In his message he calls on an European audience to just for once...
The film Message from Mukalap captures a unique sound recording from 1936 in the now extinct Khoe language !ora. It will be screened at the upcoming...
A trip to Niger on the trail of colonial crimes was an eye-opener for a young British-Nigerian poet. At the end of the 19th century, European powers came together to carve up the great African cake. One of the pieces of land allotted to the French was an area branching into the Sahara Desert in what was to become Niger. My film African Apocalypse (showing at the Docville Festival in Leuven 10,16,19 June) follows the road created by the French invasion of 1898-99 in which a French colonial officer,...
A trip to Niger on the trail of colonial crimes was an eye-opener for a young British-Nigerian poet. At the end of the 19th century, European powers came...
