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Bady Dalloul is CCA’s guest today in artists talk

The spread of things like language, trade education, love and marriage in the continent have mainly been the reason Africans have been travelling to other lands within the continent since the 10th century – long before Europeans arrived. From the Bantu expansion to the ‘Hamitic myth’ of migration from north to south, and even the…

Bady Dalloul

The spread of things like language, trade education, love and marriage in the continent have mainly been the reason Africans have been travelling to other lands within the continent since the 10th century – long before Europeans arrived.

From the Bantu expansion to the ‘Hamitic myth’ of migration from north to south, and even the Voortrekkers’ ‘Great Trek’ in South Africa, the story of migration is synonymous to Africa.

In West Africa, for instance, these migrations led to transformations in the political and economic framework of the region, and this gave European powers new knowledge of the world in the 15th century as they sailed along the West African coast.

Movement is a way of life on the continent, but no one uses the term ‘diaspora’ to describe African migrant groups who live in a foreign land within the continent.

This raises the question: why not?

The new enquiry becomes more of a debate in the face of rising population explosion in urban areas; internal conflicts incited by resource control and the exodus many Africans to find greener pastures outside the continent.

The Centre for Contemporary Art (CCA) and KADIST Paris have announced a new project called Diaspora at Home, a group show that engages the public in discussions on mobility within Africa.

Initiated by curators Iheanyi Onwuegbucha (CCA) and Sophie Potelon (KADIST), the project, which consists of two shows in Lagos, Nigeria and Paris, France, includes a programme of artist residencies in Lagos, a show and a series of artist talks and conversations at CCA, Lagos.

Today, Bady Dalloul will feature in the centre’s artist talk. Between 2013 and 2015, Dalloul produced 22 books and created several websites devoted to the political and economic organisation as well as the culture and history of fictional Pacific state — Tonkoru— which experiences the same problems and colonial history countries in the Middle East.

During the residences, the artists who come from various backgrounds and have different links and interests in Africa will engage with the diverse mobility of peoples, objects, images, information, and wastes; as well as the complex interdependencies between peoples and social consequences of such diverse mobility on the continent.

From their experiences, they will create works for a show that will address the complexity of movement within Africa- human, natural resources, knowledge and languages. The show will also be used to address the historical consequences of these movements as it concerns issues like ecology, culinary practices, racism and colonial history.

The first exhibitions and series of events will run from November 4, 2019, to January 31, 2020, at CCA Lagos, Nigeria.

Diaspora at Home returns to Paris, France between October and December 2020. This collaborative project is organized in memory of Bisi Silva (1962 – 2019), founder of CCA, Lagos who strongly believed in promoting cultural exchanges and creating new networks.

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