THE MARRAKECH BIENNALE
Founded in 2004 by Vanessa Branson and Abel Damoussi, the Marrakech Biennale is a not-for-profit association whose mission is to position Marrakech as a platform for contemporary art in Africa, the Middle East and the Mediterranean region. Amidst the rise of global tensions, entrepreneur and philanthropist Vanessa Branson envisioned a cultural festival that would address social issues through the arts, using them as a vehicle for debate and discussion and to build bridges between diverse ideologies. It was the first major Trilingual (English, Arabic and French) festival in North Africa. By benefiting from Marrakech’s ideal location as a geographic and cultural crossroads, the Marrakech Biennale has been a world class event synonymous with artistic excellence and cultural diversity, and has promoted dialogue through all forms of artistic expression. Since 2014, the Biennale has been under the leadership of the Executive President, Mohamed Amine Kabbaj.
The Biennale has focused on cutting-edge contemporary Visual Art, Literature, and Film. It has consisted of a main Visual Arts Exhibition, other arts exhibitions, installations and happenings, discussions, debates and screenings based in the eclectic venues and settings that Marrakech has to offer. The Marrakech Biennale also has an Education and Internship Program which promotes intercultural, interdisciplinary and intergenerational exchange between Morocco's student population and the artists, staff and international visitors of the Biennale.
To date, there have been 6 editions, with the last edition held in 2016. Previous curators include Reem Fadda (2016), Hicham Khalidi (2014), Dr Nadim Samman and Carson Chan (2012) and Abdellah Karroum (2009). Past participating acclaimed writers, directors, and artists include Tracy Emin, Gavin Turk, Antony Gormley, Richard E Grant, Hardeep Singh Kohli, Isaac Julien, Faouzi Bensaidi, Julian Schnabel, John Boorman, Ahdaf Soueif, Ben Okri, Hicham Benohoud, and Tala Madani, to name a few.
To find out more information on the Marrakech Biennale and see complete archives of previous editions please contact us at:
info@marrakechbiennale.org
Ministry of Culture and Communication
BIENNIAL OF CONTEMPORARY AFRICAN ART
http://biennaledakar.org/language/en/home-biennale-dakar-2020-en/
“Ĩ NDAFFA/FORGER/CREATIVE FIRE” is the theme of this 14th Biennial of Contemporary African Art; It refers to the foundational process of African creation, which nourishes the diversity of contemporary African creativities, while projecting new ways of narrating and apprehending Africa
Ĩ NDAFFA, in Serer language spoken in Senegal, denotes the dynamics and the act of creating, re-creating and refining. It refers to the forge that transforms, to the ore with which to create the new material; and the labor and fire inherent in the process of creativity. Ĩ NDAFFA consecrates the act of transforming one or more materials brought to incandescence in a fire, in order to create new shapes, textures and materials and by this gesture, a new world.
Ĩ NDAFFA draws from the creation of mythologies within a re-imagined Africa in which knowledge must be apprehended in quantum geography in order to affirm African contemporaneities rich in creativity and synthesis thereby bringing worlds into existence
By these means, Ĩ NDAFFA as forging or creating “out of fire” is not here in the sense of constructing a facsimile, but in returning to this original space of creativity, the forge, to construct new narratives and new tools for apprehending Africa.
It is therefore a question of constructing new aesthetic writings, new knowledge and know-how that integrate the African readings of the world as well as those of the other geographical and cultural areas. These allow the forging of shared tools to meet contemporary challenges such as the need of constantly renewed meaning with which to grasp the complexity of the world. This undertaking will be carried through the following points:
Exploring the knowledge deposits of the African continent and revisiting the archives. Dak’Art 2020 wishes to capture the plurality of knowledge. If the latter is an expression often postulated, the possibility of plural knowledge is scantly constructed and arranged so as to be transmitted in the academic and social space. It is through the exploration of languages, sayings and grammars of creation that Ĩ NDAFFA invites the world in a time of re-imagining Africa. If reality is to be re-apprehended, it is necessary to re-articulate our relationship to memory, history and therefore archives. If historians, experience the difficulty of negotiating the concepts of veracity and truth as to the interpretation of sources, the artist can reverse the temporalities and establish another type of relationship to archives.
Rejecting historical discontinuities. The temporalities fixed by the History of Art (Antiquity, Middle Ages and Modern Times) as well as the areas of history retained as benchmarks must be rethought from the point of view of African history. The styles and sequences drawn by the periods relating to modern and contemporary art must be reviewed and criticized through African history. The contemporary must cease to be perceived in a chronological sequence with respect to the simultaneously universalizing and neutralizing modern. The possibility of conceiving the history of art as an evolution of the use of materials is to be conceived. Our interaction with materials contains an evolution of thought about the world to construct new realities.
Establishing a relationship with the body and the creative gesture. Knowledge is experimental in the sense that it constantly pushes its limits. If art – as a language and medium of knowledge – helps us to think, it is necessary to consider the creative gesture as bearer and witness of this form of human intelligence. The gesture and the body – in artistic performance – thus extend the idea that African art is a philosophy.
Copyright 2019 – General Secretariat of the Biennale of Contemporary African Art
Marrakech 2016 Biennale
https://www.moroccoworldnews.com/2016/03/181024/marrakech-2016-biennale-art-projects/
“The Threads of Life,” Gordon has used images referencing scientific research and the use of ‘fractals’ both at the macro and micro levels. These images act as a reminder of our origins and that we are all made of the same “threads of life” whether we are Arab, African, Hispanic, or even Scottish (as is Gordon). Gordon said that his art patterns “echo the repeated movements and images found in so much Islamic art, but in a less formal and structured way.” He is a classically trained artist from Edinburgh, and his work here is featured on large aluminium modern paintings. I found that the medium of aluminium really explores the richness and depth and intensity of colour in a way not found on canvas. As well as mixed media paintings, he also showed a series of reliefs inspired by Moroccan topography.
http://www.digitalmarrakech.org/en/
DIGITAL MARRAKECH, an international media arts and digital festival, which aims to present diverse trends and practices in the fields of digital film & video, multimedia performances, Video installations, digital mapping, net art, workshops and other interdisciplinary forms
The festival program consists of live video performances, film screenings, workshops, lectures, and exhibition. In the festival framework artists from all over the world present latest practices, research and technologies and showcase important achievements in the development of media arts practices.
It is also a platform for local artists to present their work to a much larger public and to critic reviews. The festival plays a major role in expanding the opportunities for local talented film, video and interactive media artists, and offers the best of them the opportunity to produce a new works by offering two weeks master classes under the supervision of Media Arts professionals.
DIGITAL MARRAKECH, also wants to contribute in interdisciplinary collaborations between south and north, and create an atmosphere of international exchange between Moroccan artists and international ones. In this way we aim to bring together emerging artists sharing common ideas and energy, and to introduce them in a comprehensive but professional way with the newest trends in the field of Media art practices.
The idea is to make the festival a very important cultural event on the Moroccan and Arab map and unite various social spheres, like culture, arts and education. Our ambition is to turn the DIGITAL MARRAKECH Festival into an international Media Art meeting point in Marrakech.
The project takes place in different locations in Marrakech city, especially in its imperial part which is the old medina.
Nigeria - Alexis Chivir-ter
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| Afro-Renaissance |
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| https://wetheoutliers.com/portfolio/alexis-tsegba/ |
Gabon - Yannis Davy Guibinga
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