'Making Africa. A continent of contemporary design'

  “Thinking about the future means thinking about our possibilities in the world. The future belongs to Africa, because it seems to have happened everywhere else already.”

Okwui Enwezor, Consulting Curator of "Making Africa".

The exhibition offers a new tale of Africa, an invitation to value the continent from a brand new perspective. Many of the major African capitals are seeing the consolidation of a generation that, around culture and through creation and design, is defending its right to build itself in freedom, without foreign tutelage and contradicting the stereotypes projected from the West.

Making Africa exhibits the projects of artists and designers originating from and often working in Africa who are addressing a global audience and providing the world with a new perspective of their continent. They often work in various disciplines simultaneously and break with the conventional definitions of design, art, photography, architecture and film.

The new media are playing a central role and initially they made this change of perspective possible. Often produced by collectives and within an urban context, the works showcased in Making Africa connect the digital revolution with analog existence. They focus more on the process than the result. They interpret materials in a radically new way. They assume their responsibility with relation to society rather than with relation to the markets and make bold forecasts regarding the future.

Dialogue between diverse artistic disciplines

Making Africa shows works from diverse creative areas: design of objects and furniture, the graphic arts, illustration, fashion, architecture, urban planning, art, crafts, film and photography, in addition to digital and analog focuses.  

Conceived to contribute a new vision of contemporary African design, Making Africa presents works such as the eyewear sculpture of Kenyan artist Cyrus Kabiru, the furniture of Malian designer Cheick Diallo and the photographs of Mário Macilau, from Mozambique, and J.D. 'Okhai Ojeikere, from Nigeria.

The architecture of Francis Kéré, David Adjaye and Kunle Adeyemi and the extraordinary cardboard city models of Bodys Isek Kingelez along with the animation art of Robin Rhode, a South African based in Berlin, also feature in the exhibition.

All of the works presented are underpinned by a quest to address questions of material culture and everyday aesthetics – in short, questions of design. The objects demonstrate how design in Africa is understood on a much more inclusive level than in Western societies and they are proof that this understanding can produce innovative new approaches.

From the post-colonial era to the works of young contemporary artists

In the 1960s, photographers such as Seydou Keita and Malick Sidibé, or the South African magazine Drum, showed a continent beyond its wars, crises and catastrophes. The architecture produced during the initial years of independence also embodies the emergence of a new era of self-confidence that largely dissipated over the following decades. These historical documents run throughout the entire exhibition paired with contemporary works, showing how the younger generations have often consciously referred to the earlier body of work, creating a link with the positive sentiment of this past era.

The making of Making Africa

One of the distinctive features of the exhibition is its development process. During a two-year research period, numerous think tanks and interviews were held in major African cities, such as Lagos, Dakar, Cape Town, Cairo and Nairobi. During these sessions, some 70 designers, artists, researchers, architects, gallerists and curators were consulted. In the process, a unique resource on African design was compiled, which supports and enriches the exhibition and its accompanying catalogue.

Lecture series and  Xcèntric film season

Wednesday, 13 April

Africa as a story. Lecture by Chigozie Obioma

Chigozie Obioma is a nigerian writer and assistant profesor of literature and creative writing at the University of Nebraska-Lincoln. The New York Times has described him as “the heir to Chinua Achebe”. His latest novel, The Fishermen was published in April 2015 by Little, Brown and Company and was nominated for the Man Booker Prize 2015.

Monday, 18 April

My Africa. Lecture by Mia Couto

Mia Couto is a mozambican writer, winner of the Neustadt International Prize for Literature 2014 and he is nominated for the Man Booker International Prize. His latest novel, Confessions of the Lioness, was published in July 2015 by Harvill Secker.

Thursday, 21 April

Consciousness and Struggle: New Voices in African cinema

Akosua Adoma Owusu is a young director. Born in the United States to Ghanaian parents. In 2013 his short film Kwaku Ananse received a great reception in the competition of the Berlin Film Festival.

Beatriz Leal is a researcher, teacher, critic and independent curator. Since 2011 is programmer African Film Festival in NYC.