IBRAHIM MAHAMA
The organizers of Documenta 14 broke with tradition this year by extending the show, which typically appears in Kassel, Germany, every five years, to Athens. Now they have their eyes on Luanda, Angola, where they will present Documenta 14 works by 16 artists of African descent in a new show that will be staged in collaboration with the Fundação Sindika Dokolo, which was started by the eponymous Congolese collector.
The partnership aims to create, a press statement explains, “a unique multidisciplinary arts platform between Kassel, Athens, and Luanda which will act as a creative cultural exchange within the international and local artistic communities.” The specifics of this platform will be fleshed out during an upcoming press conference that includes Documenta’s artistic director, Adam Szymczyk, and its curator at large, Bonaventure Soh Bejeng Ndikung.
THEO ESHETU
The artists featured in the show are as follows:
- Akinbode Akinbiyi (Nigeria)
- Sammy Baloji (DR Congo)
- Bili Bidjocka (Cameroon)
- Manthia Diawara (Mali)
- Theo Eshetu (Ethiopia)
- Aboubakar Fofana (Mali)
- Pélagie Gbaguidi (Benin)
- iQhiya (South Africa)
- Bouchra Khalili (Morocco)
- Ibrahim Mahama (Ghana)
- Narimane Mari (Algeria)
- Otobong Nkanga (Nigeria)
- Emeka Ogboh (Nigeria)
- Olu Oguibe (Nigeria)
- Tracey Rose (South Africa)
- El Hadji Sy (Senegal)
Sindika Dokolo, whose organization aims to provide cross-continental exchanges of contemporary African art, said in a statement, “The last decade or so has seen the increased prominence of artists from Africa exhibiting across the contemporary artistic platform in the West. I am delighted to help in initiating this opportunity of showing the African artists being exhibited in Documenta 14 for the first time on the continent.”
Relating this partnership to the work of his foundation, Dokolo added, “It is a critical concern of mine that the people of Angola—and of Africa—have access to contemporary cultural discourse, as well as being able to see and discover the artistic production of multiple voices from the continent and diaspora.”