The Lyrical Art of "Twin Poets"

I heard of the lyrical art of "Twin Poets" (Al and Nnamdi)--these two young Igbo-American poets whose work I knew nothing about until--just last week. And if this performance typifies their spoken word poetry, I would not mind listening to them all the time in saecula saeculorum! 

Remembering Biafra

The shame of Nigeria, and the world that supported its murderous campaign against Biafra (because of oil in the Niger Delta), is that decades after that war, not much has changed. Nigeria remains as divided, unworkable, precarious as it was in the months and years leading up to the genocide of the Igbo in Northern Nigeria in the summer of 1966. Ojukwu has done his work and moved on, but the spirit of Biafra lives.

The structurally insufficient entity called Nigeria lumbers on--denied of total collapse only by a criminally corrupt politically elite and global economic interests--leaving in its wake now-frequent stream of "sorrow, tears and blood."  It continues to be haunted by the restless spirits of dead Biafran children; children who, unlike me, could not survive the mass starvation campaign and bombings of Biafran hospitals and markets.

When, Nigeria, will be the day of atonement?  

POST-DOCTORAL FELLOWSHIP--Univ. of Witwatersrand

POST DOCTORAL FELLOWSHIP in the Centre for Creative Arts of Africa, University of the Witwatersrand.

We invite applications for a Postdoctoral Fellowship in the Centre for the Creative Arts of Africa (CCAA) at the University if the Witwatersrand, Johannesburg. The Centre is funded by the AW Mellon Foundation and will be situated in the Wits Art Museum. The Postdoctoral Fellow will work with the Chair in the Creative Arts of Africa (Director of the Centre) on research which will work outwards from the collections of historical and contemporary African arts in the Wits Art Museum. The collection contains not only visual arts, but also musical instruments and objects which are part of performance arts and dress repertoires. We are therefore looking for a fellow who has research experience in one or more of the following fields: African visual art, African music, African performance arts, African dress. The fellow will be required to do some teaching in the Wits School of Arts undergraduate programmes, and will be expected to participate in exhibitions and publications planned within the Wits Art Museum.

The Fellowship will be for a period of 20 months and will include a stipend, a shared office with own computer, library access and a small research grant per year. The fellowship will start in March/April 2012, and will end in December 2013.

Applications must be sent to Professor Anitra Nettleton anitra.nettleton@wits.ac.za and should include

title and abstract of the doctoral thesis,

copies of completed articles or published essays (if any)

the names and email addresses of two referees, one of whom should be the supervisor of the doctorate.

Submission deadline 31^st January 2012

Chukwuemeka Odumegwu-Ojukwu (1933-2011)

Kaemesia, Enyi Biafra!

Dike eji eje mba

Nwa Sir Louis-na-Nnewi

Odumegwu Ojukwu

Jee ọfụma, Odogwu Biafra!

Nwa amụlụ n'ego

Jelụ Sandhurst tute ugo

N’afa ndị Naijiria

Nọdụ mma, Ọchịagha Biafra!

Jelu Aburi gwa Gowon

Na Igbo abụro osisi

Nụlụ na-aga egbu ya kwụlụ

Jee n'udo Ikemba Nnewi

Jee gwakwa ndị ichie

na alụ Naijiria talụ anyị n’agha

ekwerọ anyị afụ ụzọ

Ma ka m jụọkwanụ:

Onye ga-agụgụ anyị?

Ka anyị a ga-atọzị

N’akwa ndeli?

New York Times on Artur Walther's collection

Artur Walther has quietly built what might be the most important collection of African photography anywhere in the past decade or so. But only since last year when he opened his Collection's museum in Neue-Ulm, Germany and a project space in Chelsea, NY this year has he given the world the chance to appreciate the depth and breath of his photo collection (which apart from the African work is rich in contemporary Chinese photography). Just the other day when I visited him at his home in the company of Georgina Beier I was stunned by his as-yet-published collection of 19th and early 20th century photographs of Africans by Europeans. It would be great to see these in the context of an exhibition that might have the kind of images presented by Santu Mofokeng in his Black Photo Album (which Artur owns too) and other images by photographers such as Keita who he has collected in depth. Such a show will dramatize, in a spectacular fashion, the politics of subjectivity as they played out in photography during the colonial age. As it turned out, Artur is already thinking about such a project, and I look forward to it!
This article by the New York Times last week says something about the significance of the Walther Collection, and the positive impact his approach to collecting has had on artists like Jo Ractliffe (whose Nadir series of photomontage from the mid-1980s still give me the shivers) long-deserving of serious attention.

Video of "Environment and Object: Recent African Art" at Tang Museum

Here is a video of the Dunkerley Dialogue--the discussion panel organized as part of the opening of the exhbition, Environment and Object: Recent African Art, curated by Lisa Aronson and John Weber at Tang Museum of Art, Skidmore College.
Tang Museum | Resources | Video: Dunkerley Dialogue - Environment and Object - Recent African Art

Slavery Memorial Competition--Announcement

UNESCO and the Permanent Memorial Committee have just launched an international design competition for the creation of a Permanent Memorial at United Nations to the honour victims of slavery and the transatlantic slave trade during a press conference held on 30 September 2011 in New York.

The theme  for the competition: Acknowledging the Tragedy; Considering the Legacy; Lest We Forget. 

Open to: Artists, designers, sculptors and other visual arts professionals

Deadline: 19 December 2011 

 

The winner’s prize: USD 50,000

This competition falls within the framework of the International Year for People of African Descent and contribute in particular to the implementation of the Durban Declaration and Programme of Action
For details about the competition visit the UNESCO WEBSITE