Video clip from Who Knows Tomorrow Press Conference

This video clip by the German online magazine Art-in-Berlin is from the Who Knows Tomorrow press conference at the Friedrichswerder Church Museum on June 2. In the first part, Udo Kittelmann speaks in German (good for you if you understand the language!). Click here to view

Honors for Enwezor, Shonibare and Kentridge

Wall text at the Berlin Documentary Forum I, House of World Cultures, Berlin, June 2, 2010
All images copyright: Chika Okeke-Agulu

On July 2, the Royal College of Art, London will confer an honorary fellowship to my dear friend Okwui Enwezor; and honorary doctorates to Yinka Shonibare and William Kentridge. This is just to say congratulations to the three men who have done so much--in their different ways--to enrich our experience of contemporary art today. The RCA fellowship no doubt is an important acknowledgment of the significance of Enwezor work as a scholar, curator, critic and publisher in the world of contemporary. I wrote a blog last week on his most current project, the opening of his exhibition on June 12 at the Artur Walther Collection, in Ulm and the release of the companion photography book. Barely a week before, on June 6, he organized "Rules of Evidence: Text, Voice, Silence" for the First Berlin Documentary Forum at the House of World Cultures. A multimedia event that included a public conversation between Okwui Enwezor, Ecke Bonk, Tony Cokes, Walid Sadek, Juan Maidagan, and Dolores Zinny. The main event was readings by volunteers from W.G. Sebald, On the Natural History of Destruction; Antjie Krog, Country of my Skull; Philip Gourevitch, I Would Like to Inform You that Tomorrow We Will All Be Dead, all books dealing with atrocities, in a space designed by the artists Juan Maidagan & Dolores Zinny.


Okwui, Tony Cokes, Ecke Bonke, Juan Maidaga, Dolores Zinny and Walid Sadek






For his part, Shonibare Nelson's Ship in a Bottle--his critically acclaimed sculpture for the famed Fourth Plinth at Trafalgar Square, London--was unveiled in late May. And of course his Colonel and Mrs Tarleton Shooting and Scramble for Africa, installed at the Friedrichswerdersche Kirche is part of the ongoing show in Berlin, Who Knows Tomorrow. And Kentridge's major retrospective exhibition, originally organized by the San Francisco Museum of Modern Art, closed last month at the Museum of Modern Art, New York.

The World Cup and the Vuvuzela threat

Critics in Europe and the West cannot help but find stupid reasons to criticize South Africa's World Cup. Before the games started it was either that the stadia could not be ready, or scary stories about "violent Johannesburg", or about the millions supposedly shortchanged by the World Cup expense. Then the South Africans put on a great show in world class stadia. No orgy of criminal violence erupted in the streets of Jo'burg or Durban. Just throbbing streets of proud South Africans showing the world the mettle of the Rainbow Nation.

But there had to be something awfully wrong about hosting the world's greatest sporting event in Africa. And so the western media is now awash with complaints from European footballers, and couch potatoes in Chicago or Berlin who cannot hear the TV commentators; and from sports critics about a pestilence called Vuvuzela, which is, you might be surprised, not another incurable African virus on the rampage. No, they are crying about the noise made by fans blowing their plastic horns during the games! I even heard that some of the (of course western) players blame the Vuvuzela for their inability to get sleep in their hotel rooms. A Yahoo.com critic even claims that the (very colorful) Vuvuzela has drained the games of their usual color. Give me a break! Did these folks expect the South African fans to play some Beethoven or Vivaldi string quartet during the game! Or some alcohol-inspired mass-chants!

I won't be surprised if the "menace of the Vuvuzela" will now be reason to never bring the game to Africa again. For who knows what scourge the Africans will bring next time to the football game. In any case, for those calling on FIFA to ban Vuvuzela from the games, I suggest that the proper response for such action would be for the paying soocer fans to stay away from the games with their horns and let the sun-beaten empty seats, and echoes of silence be the background sight and sound for the games. I am sure FIFA, the advertisers and the complaining players will really like that!

Who Knows Tomorrow on Deutsche Welle

Deutsche Welle, the German international broadcast station did a short feature on Who Knows Tomorrow last week. To view the report click Here

For a review of the show on Deutsche Welle online, click here

I don't have a lot of pictures from the opening--well, because, I was busy talking...to everyone, not just journalists. But these I must share.



Pascale confronting his ostensibly "African" Dju Dju Beer on the opening day of Who Knows Tomorrow at the Neue Nationalgalerie, Berlin.



Ute Meta Bauer is seated on the right of Pascale's beer


Yinka Shonibare, Okwui Enwezor and Obiora Udechukwu (my esteemed teacher) at the opening. No drinks?

The Walther Collection opens in Ulm, Germany

Next week, June 12 The Walther Collection, which includes arguably the most important, far-ranging collection of modern and contemporary African photography will open with an exhibition, Events of the Self: Portraiture and Social Identity organized by Okwui Enwezor. This is a significant event for students and scholars of African photography because Artur Walther, the owner of the collection, collects deeply, with impressive number of works by key photographers and artists such as Seydou Keita, Malick Sidibe, David Goldblatt, Okhai Ojeikere, Rotimi Fani-Kayode, Samuel Fosso and others including Sammy Baloji, Oladélé Ajiboyé Bamgboyé, Yto Barrada, Candice Breitz, Allan deSouza, Theo Eshetu, Kay Hassan, Romuald Hazoumè, Pieter Hugo, Maha Maamoun, Boubacar Touré Mandémory, Salem Mekuria, Zwelethu Mthethwa, Zanele Muholi, James Muriuki, Ingrid Mwangi, Grace Ndiritu, Jo Ractliffe, Berni Searle, Mikhael Subotzky, Guy Tillim, Hentie van der Merwe, Nontsikelelo (Lolo) Veleko, and more. Enwezor's exhibition consists of 243 works by 32 artists and is organized, according to the exhibition prospectus, "into four projects filling all nine galleries in the three buildings of the new exhibition space. It integrates the work of three generations of African artists and photographers with that of modern and contemporary German photography and is designed
around three discursive frameworks: portraiture and social transition, typologies and taxonomies, and theatricality and figuration. The combination of African and German works will serve as a model for the kind of curatorial process that animates the character of the collecting program." I reckon that the this Collection will be the research Mecca for scholars of African photography for years to come.

Equally of interest is the book, Contemporary African Photography from The Walther Collection: Events of the Self: Portraiture and Social Identity edited by Okwui Enwezor. This 448-page book with more than 250 images adds to the growing number of major texts on the subject. It includes essays by Kobena Mercer, Virginia Heckert, Santu Mofokeng, Virginia Conrath-Scholl, Deborah Willis and munwa (or me, in French), plus a conversation between Willis E. Hartshorn of ICP and Artur Walther.

Given how quickly it has take Artur Walther and Enwezor (who serves as curatorial consultant) to build this collection and the beautiful facilities in , and the fact that it continues to grow, I cannot imagine what the surplus thrill of trips to Neu-Ulm in coming years. Anyways, I am also hoping that the German embassy will give me a multi-year Schengen visa so I can go, anytime my purse allows.

To visit The Walther Collection website, click here

To the 2 African Ambassadors

The day before the opening of Who Knows Tomorrow at the Neue Nationalgalerie, my colleague Udo Kittelmann informed me that 35 (mostly African) ambassadors had notified the Nationalgalerie about their decision to not show up for the opening of our exhibition. Was I surprised? Of course not. It was not difficult to realize that the only reason these folks accepted our invitation in the first instance was because of the possibility of photo-op with the Federal President. And since he had resigned his job, there was no point coming to the Nationalgalerie. Did I for once imagine that suddenly these characters were so keen on participating in a much anticipated event during which the work of important artists from the continent took center stage in the German capital city? Of course not. But I hoped somehow that not every African ambassador could be that opportunistic and phillistinic.

As it happened two Ambassadors showed up, so I write this in appreciation. First was the Ambassadors of Angola who came to support Antonio Ole as a "respected citizen of Angola" as he put it. He engaged anyone who was willing to share a banter about Antonio's work. This is a guy who understood quite well what it means to be the chief representative of his country and people in a foreign land. I could not help but thank him especially for being a different kind of ambassador. Oh, and by the way there's an announcement about Antonio's exhibition in the embassy website!

Then also there was the Liberian Ambassador who despite not having any Liberian participating in the exhibition, came to see why African artists commanded so much attention that day in Berlin print and electronic media. But she had a problem with the show, specifically Pascale Marthine Tayou's installation right in front of the Neue Nationalgalerie: Tayou apparently made a mistake in his design of the Liberian Flag, and the Ambassador was upset! Of course, it took a while to explain to her that the design of every other flag of the 54 African states was intentionally "wrongly" designed by the artist. I am not sure that the Ambassador got that, but then how many of us really get the point of a lot of contemporary art anyway. Take my response to the work of the Italian artist Rudolf Stingel for instance. During my visit to the Neue Nationalgalerie for the final installation of Pascale's work, I was impressed to see that workmen were apparently laying this floral grey-toned carpet on the entire ground-level floor of the empty gallery. Hung on the ceiling of the massive space was a large chandelier that was for sure less impressive than the ones hanging in the Bellevue Palace. "So they are getting ready for the President," I said to Udo, gesturing toward the working men (Dr. Kohler had not yet announced his resignation). "Oh, that's Stingel's installation," Udo said.

Anyway, thanks to the two Ambassadors that came: His Excellency Mr. Alberto Ribeiro and Her Excellency Mrs Sedia Massaquoi-Bangoura.