the cultural agenda of “World Africa”

Every Friday, the cultural agenda of World Africa offers you events to follow on the continent, in France and elsewhere in the world.

The “Africa2020” season ended on September 29, but there is still time to take advantage of certain events organized as part of this pan-African and multidisciplinary cultural season. The Cité des arts, in Saint-Denis de la Réunion, is thus hosting the exhibition “The Dark Side of the Moon Brought to Light” for a few more weeks. This is a selection of images presented during the twelfth edition of the African Photography Meetings, in December 2019 in Bamako, whose theme was “Currents of consciousness”.

Until November 27, it will therefore be possible to see the works of photographers and videographers from Africa and the diaspora. Among the 17 artists exhibited, the Egyptian Ibrahim Ahmed (born in 1984 in Kuwait and who now lives in Cairo), whose work questions colonization, power and identity, and the Mauritian Nirveda Alleck, who has been leading since 2006 the “Continuum” project, a kind of gallery of portraits and stories of ordinary people that she meets during her travels.

• El Anatsui at the Conciergerie

It was the inaugural exhibition of the “Africa 2020” season. “In search of freedom”, the poetic installation by sculptor El Anatsui, born in Ghana in 1944 and who lives in Nigeria, is visible until November 14 in Paris. France had never before devoted an exhibition to this artist who has acquired worldwide fame since his participation in the Venice Biennale in 1990 and whose works are exhibited at the Center Pompidou (Paris) and at the Museum of Modern Art (MOMA ) from New York.

Under the vaults of the Conciergerie, he presents a work that calls upon the five elements (water, stone, wind, wood and metal) to apprehend this place, a former medieval royal palace that became a prison under the Revolution, bordered by the Seine. Saturday October 30 and Saturday November 6 at 3:30 p.m., the Conciergerie offers the event “El Anatsui, the elements in the air”, a tale that plunges us into the world of the Ghanaian sculptor.

• Ethical fashion with the Golden Drop

The fashion of the continent and its diaspora is in the spotlight during the “Ethical Fashion Days”, a weekend of events organized at the 360 ​​Paris Music Factory, a place of creation and distribution of music in the heart of the Goutte d’Or, in the XVIII^e arrondissement of Paris, October 30 and 31.

For professionals in the sector, this event is an opportunity to listen, in masterclasses and conferences, to some big names in African fashion in France, as well as designers from the continent such as the South African Lukhanyo Mdingi. The curious will be able to participate – by registration only – in guided tours of workshops in the XVIII^e arrondissement, as well as a musical brunch.

The “Ethical Fashion Days” are part of the “Ethical Fashion Initiative”, a program supervised by the United Nations and the World Trade Organization (WTO) and founded in 2009 to enable artisans from Africa and ‘Asia living in difficult conditions to become regular suppliers of major international brands.

• Gardens of Africa on the banks of the Loire

Magnified by the colors of autumn, the domain of Chaumont-sur-Loire (Loir-et-Cher) permanently hosts the garden of Leon Kluge. The South African landscaper received a “green card” in 2019 to create a work in the contemporary 10-hectare park of the Goualoup meadows. Its design, which combines metal, earth and plants, reflects the diversity of the fauna, flora and habitat of the African continent.

For those who could come to the estate this weekend, the creations of the 2021 Art Season are still visible until the 1st^is November, including the outdoor plant work Les Herbes folles du Vieux Logis, by the Malagasy artist Joël Andrianomearisoa.

–