The Lalela Project and Robin Rhode in Cape Town
The communal power of wall drawing: Robin Rhode engages the local children in a site-specific intervention I live in a city, New York, where art is too often discussed as a commodity. It saddens me because I have had the most moving experiences and insights into the human mind and spirit in front of paintings. [...]
Rainbow Serpent: Romald Hazoume and the African Cosmos
Art and Survival On a Sunday afternoon I went to the Newark Museum to attend a talk by Romald Hazoumé on the occasion of the opening of the exhibition African Cosmos: Stellar Arts, which explores the interactions of African cultural astronomy and the arts, traditional and contemporary. Hazoume’s Rainbow Serpent /Dan Ayido-Huedo is a large [...]
“African Spirits” by artist Samuel Fosso
Collecting African contemporary photography. Three years ago I decided to put together a small collection of African contemporary photography. I am a collector at heart, I love the process of looking , getting to learn about the artists and the world they live in, understanding the particular issues being addressed in their art, following the [...]
Awesome Tapes from Africa at Lisa Cooley
Sunday, May 20th, the Lisa Cooley gallery saw an unusual sight- cassette tapes. Brooklyn’s Brian Shimkovitz, author of popular blog Awesome Tapes from Africa, brought his collection of rare African tapes from across the continent to the intimate Lower East Side venue. In between mounted pieces by Michael Bauer, Shimkovitz took us on an audio journey across Zimbabwe, [...]
Poaching in Africa: the scale of the problem
Following Prince William’s passionate anti-poaching speech, we look at the disturbing facts behind the poaching spree. A horn can change hands at £40,000 per kilogram (2.2lb), compared with £33,000 for a kilogram of gold Photo: ALAMY By Charles Starmer-Smith and Brian Jackman In the years before the Tusk Trust was established in 1990, poaching was [...]
News: Update on the medical front in Kenya.
Children awaiting heart surgery. Tanuja Walli, founder of the Paediatric Support Group in Mombassa, was sharing her frustration with me : Nine children from the Coast area of Kenya died in the last couple of months while they were awaiting a slot to get heart surgery in Nairobi. Why does that happen? First there [...]
“Now Is As Authentic As Then” Says Holland Cotter
NY Times Art Critic, Holland Cotter continues his report on Art in Africa, In Mali, Art as Real as Life Itself. He captures eloquently how Africa challenges Western ideals of authenticity: “Taste is habit, a form of learned behavior. And habit is what we rely on to make us feel at home and comfortable in [...]
Tinariwen: A perspective on Northern Mali turmoil
Tinariwen are a band of Touareg-Berber musicians from the Sahara desert region of Northern Mali. They have performed internationally and their fifth album Tassili won the Award for Best World Music Album in 2011. It was recorded in the rocky desert as you can see in the video. Tinariwen share their perspective on the events in Northern [...]
Miracle workers in East Africa
The cure to an over-sized heart. There are some faces you never forget, that stop you in your tracks and remind you of the miracles in this life. The alert and happy face of Mbura Mwakia with his beaming smile is just one of those. Mbura is 14 years old but his body really looks [...]
Congolese Wrestlers by Colin Delfosse
These images taken in Kinshasa by Colin Delfosse, a documentary photographer and member of the collective Out of Focus, remind me of the theatricality of Pieter Hugo‘s Nollywood photography series. However here, there is an added mystical and magical “voodoo” element. Delfosse writes from Kinshasa in 2010: Eight million inhabitants, thousands of shegués (street children), [...]
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