Call for Applications:
TSA Art Writing Master Class II
Application Opens: June 13, 2019
Application Deadline: July 7, 2019
Master Class Dates: August 26 – 30, 2019
Participation Fee Deadline: August 20, 2019
Following the successful debut of the TSA Art Writing Master
Class in 2018, TSA African Culture Foundation is pleased to announce the second
edition of the program which will take place on August 26 – 30, 2019.
The facilitator is Chika Okeke-Agulu, award-winning art critic
and professor of art history at Princeton University.
The TSA Art Writing Master Class is an intensive one-week
program for art writers, culture journalists, curators and other art
professionals from African countries who wish to improve their analytical
skills and writing on modern and contemporary art. It is an uncommon platform
facilitating exchange between leading voices in the arts and early to
mid-career art professionals.
Leading the program for the second time, Professor
Okeke-Agulu comments that “Following the very successful inaugural session last
year, I very much look forward to returning for the second Art Writing Master
Class. I firmly believe that this unique and intensive program will help
produce a new generation of confident, compelling, and conscientious art
writers for Nigeria, West Africa, and beyond.”
At the second edition, participants will be exposed to the
different approaches of art criticism, art history and complexities, and how to
write coherent analytical essays through interactive lectures, hands-on
exercises, and visits to art exhibitions in the Lagos metropolis. They will be
taught how to study art in isolation and within the broader debates of society.
Delicate issues such as plagiarism, the power dynamics between artist, critic,
and curator, and maintaining the fundamental ethos of criticism in an
increasingly commercial art world will be extensively discussed.
The Master Class further offers opportunities for networking
and access to critical resources that will enhance the participants’ careers.
Like the preceding year, it promises to be productive, creative and intense. It
will culminate in a writing project that will be considered for publishing in
notable print and online publications.
TSA Art Writing Master Class II is generously supported by
Hydrocarbon Advisors and Angels and Muse. Our media partner is The Guardian
Nigeria, an award-winning and trusted newspaper in Africa. Through the friends
of TSA African Culture Foundation, a limited number of outstanding applicants
will be awarded grants to cover the workshop tuition. Particularly, female
applicants and individuals from cities outside Lagos are encouraged to apply
for this competitive grant. If you would like to benefit from this
endowment, please include such request in your letter of motivation to
be considered. Details of the grant donors are available to applicants and to
the general public at the beginning of the program.
Who can apply?
Art writers, culture journalists, practising curators and
curatorial scholars, interested final year undergraduates as well as fresh
graduates and art & culture bloggers. Previous participants are encouraged
to apply.
Benefits to participants:
– Improving their understanding of art and
visual literacy.
– Developing simple, precise and coherent
language for art analysis.
– Learning how to develop content,
argument, and a compelling voice in art criticism.
– The opportunity of a one-on-one with the
lead facilitator to discuss their individual challenges in the field of art and
possible solutions.
– The opportunity to write for art
publications and earn income as a writer.
– The opportunity for networking and
connecting with other professionals in the field.
Application requirements:
– A portfolio of published writings in
print and/or online publications is compulsory for art writers and journalists.
– Final year undergraduates, fresh
graduates and curatorial scholars are required to submit sample writings only.
– All applicants must fit into the
categories of “who can apply” and be able to prove this.
– All applicants must be resident in
Africa.
– All applicants must have a post-secondary
school qualification.
– All applicants must be proficient in
both written and spoken English as classes will be taught in English language
only.
Applicants must submit ALL of the following documents in
a single PDF file:
– Filled application form. (Download the
form
here)
– A CV of the applicant (not more than 2
pages).
– All applicants must fit into the
categories of “who can apply” and be able to prove this.
– Two samples of published (and
unpublished) writings about art or a similar field (i.e. photography, dance,
performance, video art, etc.). The sample writing could be an opinion piece, a
review, a short essay or a blog post not exceeding 1500 words.
– A motivation letter explaining why you
want to attend the Master Class. 500 words maximum.
Please send all application materials as an attachment in
one properly formatted pdf packet to
projects@thesoleadventurer.com.
by June 30, 2019. Participants will be selected by a panel of independent art
professionals who are not members of TSA African Culture Foundation and TSA Art
Magazine.
Participation Fee:
Only selected applicants will be notified and required to
pay a participation fee of N35,000. Deadline for payment is August 20,
2019.
Please note, participants will be responsible for their own
travel, accommodation and boarding arrangements during the Master Class in
Lagos. Assistance in the form of information and advice will be provided to
participants from outside Nigeria.
Key Persons
Master Class Program Director – Bukola Oyebode
Bukola Oyebode is an art writer, editor and publisher. She
is the founder and managing editor of the visual arts magazine The Sole
Adventurer (TSA). As a writer, she has made contributions to online and print
magazines. She also contributes to exhibition publications and has covered
biennales including Dak’Art (Senegal), Venice Biennale (Italy) and Jogja
Biennale XIII (Indonesia). In 2017, she was guest editor of Intense Art
Magazine special publication on women artists in Nigeria.
Oyebode is a graduate of English from Lagos State
University, Nigeria. She organises social and cultural programs through TSA
African Culture Foundation.
Master Class Lead Facilitator – Chika Okeke-Agulu (MFA,
Ph.D.)
Professor Chika Okeke-Agulu is an artist, curator, critic
and art historian. He is Director of Graduate Studies, Department of Art and
Archaeology at Princeton University, and specializes in classical, modern, and
contemporary African and African Diaspora art history and theory. He previously
taught at The Pennsylvania State University, University of Nigeria, Nsukka, and
Yaba College of Technology, Lagos. He began his career in Lagos as an art
critic for the newspapers African Concord, Daily Times and Guardian.
He is the author of Obiora Udechukwu: Line, Image,
Text (Skira Editore, 2016); Postcolonial Modernism: Art and
Decolonization in Twentieth-Century Nigeria (Duke, 2015); and (with
Okwui Enwezor), Contemporary African Art Since 1980 (Damiani,
2010). He is co-editor of Ezumeezu: Essays on Contemporary Art and
Architecture, a festschrift in Honour of Demas
Nwoko (Goldline & Jacobs, 2012); and Who Knows
Tomorrow (König, 2010). His latest curatorial project, the traveling
exhibition, El Anatsui: Triumphant Scale (co-organized with Okwui Enwezor) opened
at Haus der Kunst, Munich in March.
His writings have appeared in African Arts, Meridians:
Feminism, Race, Internationalism, Artforum International, New York Times,
Packett, Art Journal, South Atlantic Quarterly and October. He is co-editor of
Nka: Journal of Contemporary African Art and maintains the blog Ọfọdunka.
He is on the Transnational Advisory Board, Hyundai Tate
Research Center, Tate Modern, London; Advisory Board, Center for Advanced Study
in the Visual Arts, National Gallery of Art, Washington, DC; and on the
Selection Committee, Getty/ACLS Postdoctoral Fellowships in the History of Art.
His many awards include Frank Jewett Mather Award for Distinction in Art
Criticism (2016), and Melville J. Herskovits Prize for the Most Important
Scholarly Work in African Studies (2016).
Key Partners
Hydrocarbon Advisors
Led by respected Lagos art patron Hakeem Adedeji,
Hydrocarbon Advisors Limited is an investment banking advisory firm established
in 2015 uniquely focused on providing strategic financial guidance.
Angels and Muse
Angels and Muse is a creative hub for nurturing and
empowering artistic talent. Founded by influential artist Victor Ehikhamenor,
the space offers itself as a support system for expression, productivity and
education for the best creative heads and minds in Nigeria and around the
world. Already, Angels and Muse boasts of harbouring exceptional creative
talent, with the construction of the physical space designed by Tosin Oshinowo,
architect and designer of the Maryland Mall in Lagos and the renowned sculptor,
Olu Amoda, who made the hub’s state-of-the-art door.
The Guardian Nigeria
The Guardian (Nigeria), an award-winning and trusted
newspaper in Africa. It is an independent newspaper, established in 1983 for
the purpose of presenting balanced coverage of events, and of promoting the
best interests of Nigeria. It owes allegiance to no political party, ethnic
community, religious or other interest groups. Its primary commitment is to the
integrity and sovereignty of the Federation of Nigeria, and beyond that to the
unity and sovereignty of Africa. Led by Toke Alex Ibru, The Guardian (Nigeria)
is one of the few local newspapers still dedicated to reporting the arts in
Africa.
The Sole Adventurer (TSA)
The Sole Adventurer is a media and cultural projects
initiative operating as TSA Art Media and TSA African Culture Foundation. The
media platform publishes about contemporary visual arts from Africa on
www.thesoleadventurer.com and
in special print publications. Originally focused on Nigeria, the editorial
interests now include other African countries, their linked diaspora locations
and where the news is exciting and relevant to our growing audience.
thesoleadventurer.com reaches
art enthusiasts and professionals in different cities in Africa, Europe and the
US.
As a cultural foundation, TSA organises projects at the
intersection of culture, education and society. Our initiatives include Art
Forum Africa and TSA Art Writing Master Class.
TSA has enjoyed the support and partnership of The
Netherlands Embassy in Lagos, the French Cultural Network in Nigeria, Ford
Foundation, Women and Youth Art Foundation, and most recently the Goethe
Institute in Nigeria.
