20 January 2020, Headed by Bonaventure Soh Bejeng Ndikung and featuring a curatorial team including Aziza Harmel, Astrid Sokona Lepoultier, and Kwasi Ohene-Ayeh; as well as artistic advisors Akinbode Akinbiyi and Seydou Camara; and scenographer Cheick Diallo, the 12th Bamako Encounters is one of the largest to date. The artist list is equally expansive, with 85 artists and collectives who reflect a truly global and complex African experience and culture. Bamako-based Malian writer Ousmane Diarra comments on the particularities of this edition.
22 January 2020, Siddhartha Mitter on the 12th Rencontres de Bamako.
23 January 2020, The Benin Bronzes, some of Africa’s greatest treasures, were looted in 1897. After a chance encounter, two men made it their mission to return them by Alex Marshall.
17 January 2020, The 2010s not only saw the rise of new and urgent social movements – #BlackLivesMatter, Occupy, #FeesMustFall, Extinction Rebellion, #MeToo – it also witnessed the emergence of a generation of bold artists, new art fairs, photo-sharing apps and a journey’s end for this short century’s most thrilling curator, writes Sean O’Toole.
16 January 2020, In the wake of initiatives to repatriate Africa’s stolen property, the author of this letter asks the French President to repair what his ancestors have broken, before attempting to restore the war trophies of colonial conquest by Manthia Diawara.