Today’s technological advancement and interculturalism have completely transformed the philosophical interpretation of what is aesthetically pleasing or engaging, altered perspectives on culturalism as well as offer a wide range of media needed to express one’s ideas and thought processes. Subsequently, contemporary African artists derive impetus from these contemporary unlimited possibilities to invent multifaceted artistic formalisms.
Ng’endo Mukii, Homage to Wangari Maathai, 2018. Courtesy of the artist
Participating artists: Anna Binta Diallo (Senegal/Canada), Djibril Drame (Senegal), Abdoul Ganiou Dermani (Togo), Betelhem Makonnen (Ethiopia), Ng’endo Mukii (Kenya/USA), Nyancho NwaNri (Nigeria), Harold Offeh (Ghana/UK), Haythem Zakaria (Tunisia)
Drawn from practices that are touched by video art and film, House of Reasoned Truths assembles works by African artists who consider community and social fabric, feminist histories, diasporic subjectivity, geopolitical and environmental forces, performativity, and power issues. Over the past three decades, video art has increasingly become an accepted genre of visual expression in the field of contemporary African art and also as a veritable form of visual culture. Representing the current energy, vitality, and range of expression in Africa’s thriving arts scene, House of Reasoned Truths emphasises societal discourses especially the challenges of modern existence, and offers a new kind of gaze on narratives and spectacles of globalism.
As the artifactuality and history of contemporary African art continue to unfold, the selected artists exploring different techniques use a varied vocabulary to convey their ideas that reflect the social and political concerns of today’s cultural context. Referring to the American philosopher of art Arthur C. Danto, these artists use the socially constructed conventions of their own social world and produce work that speaks to such conventions and the tensions they cause.
‘House of Reasoned Truths’ acts as a catalyst for an on-going process of open discussion and intellectual inquiry about Africa and the world today, beyond historically reductive classifications.
About the curator
Kisito Assangni is a Togolese-French curator and consultant who studied museology at Ecole du Louvre in Paris. Currently living between London and Paris, his research interests gravitate towards the cultural impact of globalisation, psychogeography, and critical education. He investigates the modes of cultural production that combine theory and practice. Assangni is heavily involved in video, performance, and experimental sound.
His discursive public programs and exhibitions have been shown internationally, including the Venice Biennale, ZKM, Karlsruhe; Whitechapel Gallery, London; Centre of Contemporary Art, Glasgow; Museum of Contemporary Art, Sydney; Malmo Konsthall, Sweden; Torrance Art Museum, Los Angeles; National Centre for Contemporary Arts, Moscow; HANGAR Centre of Contemporary Art, Lisbon among others.
Assangni has participated in talks, seminars, and symposia at numerous institutions such as the British Museum, London; Palais de Tokyo, Paris; Ben Uri Museum, London; Kiasma Museum of Contemporary Art, Helsinki; Kunsthall 3.14, Bergen; Sala Rekalde Foundation, Bilbao; Depart Foundation, Malibu; Cambridge School of Art, UK; Sint-Lukas University, Brussels; University of Plymouth, UK; University of Pretoria, South Africa; Motorenhalle Centre of Contemporary Art, Dresden. He is a contributing editor at ArtDependence Magazine and Arshake. Assangni is the founder of TIME is Love Screening (International video art program) and serves as curatorial advisor to Latrobe Regional Gallery in Morwell – Victoria, Australia.
The exhibition will be on view from the 15th until the 21st of May, 2023. For more information , please visit Rabat, Capital of African Culture.
