Bubblegum Club

Author: Christa Dee

  • Photographer Viola Di Sante // terrifying stillness and delicate female figures

    Photographer Viola Di Sante // terrifying stillness and delicate female figures

    Young photographer Viola Di Sante unconsciously channels the creative energy of photographer David Uzochukwu, pop art artist David Hockney and photographer Viviane Sassen‘s use of shadows and twisted bodies with her own images. She explains that her desire to use photography as a medium came from a need to preserve moments, forcing herself to see in photographs.

    Despite the presence of bright colours in her photographs, there is a hazy gloom that seems to haunt her images. This results in a terrifying stillness, not reflecting a moment captured, but an emotion sitting on the heart. An image of a young women floating in a lake amongst reeds is reminiscent of Impressionist painter Monet’s The Water Lilies – Setting Sun. However, the muted colours and texture from her film camera present the image as a dream or a lost memory.

    A photograph of white poolside recliners brings to mind David Hockney’s painting A Bigger Splash. However, her work puts forward an eerie atmosphere that brings one to imagine a quiet, subtle breeze surrounding feelings of abandonment.

    Although her work can be interpreted as presenting a creepy stillness, there is a vein of feminine touches that pumps life into Di Sante’s photographs. This comes across in the delicate occurrences of flowers, female figures and clouds.

    This year she took part in the 30 Under 30 / Women Photographers exhibition at The Popping Club in Rome.

    To check out her Tumblr to have a look at more of her work.

  • Illustrator Panteha Abareshi // visually representing the realities of anxiety and depression

    17-year-old Tuscan (Arizona) illustrator Panteha Abareshi is making work that attempts to capture the realities of living with a mental illness. Through her images she represents the struggles that come with anxiety and depression. More than that, she portrays women of colour with strength that shines beyond how they may feel at times. This strength comes from acknowledging vulnerability and confusion. Taking inspiration from the likes of Erykah Badu, films by David Lynch as well as her Iranian/Jamaican upbringing, the main driver for her journey into the art world was the time she spent in the hospital due to her being born with Sickle Cell Beta Thalassemia. She turned her frequent visits to hospital beds into metaphorical studio visits.

    The knives, snakes and roses that appear to be inflicting pain on the women she draws are physical manifestations of the pain that these women are feeling.

    It’s All Excruciating, 2017. From the series ‘Girls//People’.

    A second foundation on which her work is built relates to her rejection of unrealistic understandings of love. “My artwork is a direct expression of my beliefs that the way young people, especially girls, are taught to value, prioritize and derive happiness from ‘love’ is damaging and wrong. I struggle with the societal standards for romance, love and sex constantly, and express that in my work because I want to normalize the notion of women/people not craving intimacy,” Abareshi explains in her artist bio.

    Abareshi hosted her first solo show in New York City in April at Chinatown’s Larrie Gallery where she exhibited a series of works titled “Blessed Is The Pain”. With these works she unpacks what it was like to grow up with divorced parents who have polar opposite attitudes towards religion. “My father, who immigrated from Iran, is a steadfast atheist, and never spoke to me about religion. My mother, who immigrated from Jamaica, is a fiercely devout Christian,” she explains in her artist statement. Being forced to go to church and learn bible verses, while discovering her identity as a woman and holding reservations about Christianity, resulted in damaging interpretations of her personality. These and other experiences while she was growing up contributed towards her anxiety and depression. The works that she put together for her solo show visually represent this tumultuous time.

    To check out more of Abareshi’s work visit her website.

    Flesh, 2017. From the series ‘Blessed is the Pain’

  • Moozlie – using her feminine energy as a super power in the SA hip hop scene

    As I walked in the room I could hear Moozlie‘s voice bubbling in the air. We sat down together to have a conversation about her career and her latest project VERSUS which will be dropping on Friday. The slight raspy texture to her voice adds a subtle sexiness that even my recorder couldn’t help but obsess over. After a few introductory giggles, Moozlie began telling me about how the desire she had to be on TV from a young age began to unfold.

    “I always used to present [YOTV’s] Wildroom in my bedroom,” she says, “Even in class. My friend and I always used to do it during lunch time. Just growing up seeing CeeCee, Sifo and all those presenters made me really want to get on TV. I never really thought about myself being a musician. That’s something that just came up in the last couple of years.”

    Being part of what she describes as the “slash generation”, Moozlie manages to juggle her emceeing, presenting and music career like a pro. While she is a veteran at hosting events and presenting on TV, she expresses that she has moved at a slower pace with her music. She has made sure to take the time to learn and experiment more with her music.

    Curious about how she transitioned to the South African hip hop scene, I asked Moozlie how she imagined herself in that space. “I used to host a lot of parties and events. I think after a while a lot of people started t notice how really into the music I was and how when I was on stage it was like I was performing my own songs. So I think in 2014 or 2015 in the SA hip hop scene really blew up CashTime was looking to sign a female artist.” Looking beyond the musical talent, CashTime was also interested in someone who could grab an audience with her presence. And who better than Moozlie. She confesses that music was not something that she had always envisioned as part of her path, but when the opportunity came knocking, she was ready to let it into her life. “And that’s where it started,” she continues, “It started really slow. I spent more time around musicians than I did actually making music. It was a cool way for me to learn about the music industry and what it means to be an artist.”

    Reflecting on the time she spent with these artists, being able to grow a thick skin as well as understanding the need to be patient are two of the biggest lessons she has learnt. “You get a lot of big ideas in your head but it takes a lot to actually bring those ideas to life,” Moozlie expresses.

    Although her work is always about being true to herself, she does not mind sharing the limelight with her two alter egos, Griselda Blanco and Young Mma Br. Griselda is “an absolute mob boss. She was one of the most renowned women in the Miami drug trade, although I do not condone drugs. I think she just had like a kill or be killed mentality,” Moozlie explains. Channeling one of her childhood icons, Young Mma Br helped Moolzie to find her place among the well-known, established artists part of Cash Time.

    Continuing with this train of thought, Moolzie emphasized that being a woman in a male-dominated industry should not be looked at in a negative light. “You should use it as a super power because there are so many female stories that have not been told yet. I think that female artists are incredible, not just in rap but all around. I don’t think young girls who want to be part of the industry should feel intimidated.” For her this super power allows women to translate the fact that women and women’s work is the backbone of society. By working towards changing the narrative of women in this industry as survivors to the view that they are conquerors, Moozlie is hoping that her super power will be able to translate that women lay the foundation into the arts.

    This attitude can be seen with her upcoming project, VERSUS. “A lot of people wanted me to drop an album but I think because I went to the top of the hip hop game and worked with such big artists, I definitely feel like I missed a few stages. So with VERSUS I just wanted to go back a little bit and work with some of the producers I met along the way.” Through these ten tracks Moozlie has tapped into different aspects of her personality. It is a combination of trap, rap, reggae and hip hop, making VERSUS a reflection of the slash generation. “You are going to be dancing, bobbing your head, turning up and chilling in your car. And that makes sense because we live in the slash generation. Although you maybe have particular musical preferences, there are other songs from other genres that many appeal to you too,” Moozlie explains.

    Be sure to check out Moozlie on Instagram to be one of the first to listen to VERSUS!

  • Exploring the politics of fashion at the AFROPUNK x Umuzi RINGA! exhibition

    Umuzi in partnership with AFROPUNK put together the exhibition RINGA!, Exhibition of Taal on the 5th of October. Reflecting on the weight that language holds, with regards to identity and being able to connect with other people, this exhibition focused on the concept of language in Southern Africa as a complex singularity, rather than languages as separate entities.

    A group of young Umuzi artists teamed up with Sandile Radebe and ߔߎ߯ߟߍ߫ ߞߊ-ߖߊ߬ߣߏ߬ߟߌ߲߯ߗߌ to use Isibheqe, an indigenous writing system for Southern African languages, as a medium to convey an everyday, pan-lingual experience. These works were premised on the idea of language as a flowing system that has the ability to carve out pathways and connect back to itself. The exhibition aimed to provide viewers with an experience within which they can engage with language in a non-hierarchical manner. The exhibition was curated by Chantelle Lue, Afari Kofi, Clayton Nkateko, ߔߎ߯ߟߍ߫ ߞߊ-ߖߊ߬ߣߏ߬ߟߌ߲߯ߗߌ, Sandile Radebe, and Odendaal Esterhuyse.

    Fashion could also be interpreted as a kind of language, and in the same way that language carries political weight, so does fashion. I interviewed five people who attended the exhibition to chat to them about the politics of fashion.

    Themba Nkuna

    Wearing wide-rimmed white glasses and his mother’s shirt under his coat, Themba Nkuna caught my eye. In conversation about what he is wearing he mentioned, “I’m gay so I like to blend masculinity and femininity.” He also emphasized how his star sign, Cancer, influences how he has gotten to know parts of himself. “I rise as a Cancer so my emotions just change. Every day I wake up I am a different person. My emotions guide me. And my clothes are a representation of that.”

    Photograph of Tiniko Baloyi

    Tiniko Baloyi

    Floating in a sea of people, Tiniko’s white beret bobbed around as she animated the conversation she was lost in. Pulling her aside we spoke about what is means to be a woman of colour in the city, and how this plays into her fashion choices. “I am black and a women. I think that certain things are presented by me from a certain perspective. But it is not necessarily something I think about and want to bring out,” she states about how she chooses to dress herself. “I like different ethnicities. I am drawn to different ethnic groups. Where they come from does not really matter. I also like street cultures. That’s a kind of ethnicity that is more urban. This also influences my personal style.”

    Photograph of Tiniko Baloyi
    Photograph of Alora Reine

    Alora Reine

    With her locs swinging from side to side as we walked in the dimly lit street beside the exhibition, Alora shared with me how she combines thrifting with her chic grunge aesthetic. “I make and paint my own clothes as well,” she adds. “Self expression is very important to me,” she continues. Emphasizing how she is pro-Black in all senses of the word, Alora explains how African apparel completes her chic grunge look as well as bring to the fore her pro-Black sentiments. “My pro-Blackness does not influence how I think about other Eurocentric cultures or trends,” she argues. However, she does present a humanist alignment when she mentions, “First of all I am a human being before I am a black human being. Before I am a pro-Black woman.”

    Photograph of Alora Reine
    Photograph of Allyssa

    Allyssa

    Fine Arts student Allyssa amalgamates the feminine and masculine in how she thinks about fashion. Mentioning that studying Fine Art has helped her to find her personal style, she states that, “I am a young woman…I don’t care about looking very feminine all the time because I do not think that is important. I don’t need to look like a ‘lady’ everyday. I usually wear really baggy things. I wear my dad’s clothes. I buy men’s clothes. I buy women’s clothes. I buy whatever I like. I don’t care about what anyone else things about what I like.”

    Photograph of Allyssa
    Photograph of Chantelle Lue

    Chantelle Lue

    Even while wearing all black, Chantelle brought light with her presence while in conversation with me. “Although my entire wardrobe is black and I think that is just a hang-up of my life in architecture, [my personal style] is a case of comfort and speedy changing.” She mentioned that she finds strength in black. “I have recently shaved my head which I guess was indicative of a new start and it means that I have got nothing to hide behind anymore. I feel a bit exposed at the moment but I find strength in that. I recently dyed it blonde…I think the fact that I don’t wear dresses or I guess my style tends to be quite androgynous, there may be something in that. But for practical reasons I find that I am more agile dressed compactly in black.”

  • Sara Andreasson // illustrations premised on feminist values

    Swedish illustrator Sara Andreasson has been commissioned by big names such as Nike, Selfridges and Converse. Her images are comprised of simple solid shapes outlines by contrasting colours.  Her combinations of purple, pink, brown and mustard allow viewers to travel back in time to a 1970s colour palette.

    Presenting women as powerful figures is a thread that is subtly carried through in all of her work. This can be seen through her stylistic choice to make female figures appear as the larger, dominant figures when illustrated among other characters or objects, in a similar manner to how one would establish a hero shot in a film through the use of the right camera angle.

    ‘Women in Business’ for Le Monde, 2017

    She has decided to take a break from her commissioned work and to focus on more personal projects, mostly revolving around women and presenting a more direct relationship with feminist values. Her portrayal of women challenges the notion that beauty can only be defined by achieving a particular waist size.

    “I try to make careful decisions in my work and strive to create images that aren’t reinforcing stereotypes…I identify as a feminist and I do consider some – but not all – of my work a form of low-key activism,” Andreasson expresses in an interview with i-D.

    Andreasson, in partnership with her friend Josefine Hardstedt, publishes her own zine titled BBY. The foundation of this zine is to celebrate female and queer creatives, and contribute towards building “a sense of sisterhood.”

    Visit her website to check out more of her work.

    Part of a series of Illustrations for Ace & Tate
    Part of a series of Illustrations for Ace & Tate

  • Wekafore’s FW 2017 Lookbook

    Nigerian designer Wekaforé Maniu Jibril was born into an appreciation of craftsmanship. With a father who is an architect, a mother who is a textile manufacturer and a grandfather who was a tailor in the Ogori village, it is not surprise that he made fashion design a permanent part of his life. He moved to the UAE with his family when their home was destroyed by a fire. Facing racial discrimination and familial financial difficulties, he never lost the memories he had learning basic stitching from his father and spending time helping his mother in her workshop. A ‘By Wekafore‘ imprint was launched in 2013 with a capsule collection titled ‘Welcome to Black’ produced in Dubai.

    His Wekafore brand pays homage to his grandfather’s work, who died in his village without being able to witness the forms that fashion takes in city life. Working with a team of creatives from Kyiv in the Ukraine who took an interest in the story behind the brand, Wekaforé has managed to build his brand.

    Wekafore designs branch out from the roots of Wekaforé’s nostalgia and the framework set out by Negritude writers. He is also inspired by African photographers such as Mali’s Malick Sidibe whose black and white images documented the popular culture in Bamako during the 60s and 70s. With the aim of highlighting a different side of black culture, the brand draws on 1970s street fashion and combines this with neat tailoring methods. This can be seen in the Fall/Winter 2017 lookbook titled ‘Thank You Florence’. Wide-leg pants, velvet dresses and leather shorts can be seen alongside t-shirts with prints inspired by Nigerian TV, sweatpants and a metallic skirt.

    Check out the Wekafore website to have a look at the full lookbook.

    Photographer: Catalina Almada/WEKAFORE
    Stylist: Guadalupe Yapura

  • Takeover: Bree Street // reimagining Bree Street

    AbdouMaliq Simone’s notion “people as infrastructure” refers to residents’ abilities to combine objects, people, spaces and activities, and their combination of these resulting in a form of infrastructure (Simone 2004: 407-408). Applying this concept to the photographic series, Takeover: Bree Street by young creatives Sara Lagardien and Haneem Christian, I argue that their project pushes for a form of self-curated infrastructural change.

    After forced segregation, the feeling of division remains carved into Cape Town’s urban form, through space that is associated with particular race and class groupings. The spatial engineering that was the thread that kept Apartheid’s fabric together, still lingers. And not as a momentary smell in the air that wafts between conversations of diversity and non-racialism, but as a permanent stench that needs to be addressed with a more direct repellent. The conception of Cape Town as a white-only centre is engrained in its architectural layout, which permeates an energy that Sara and Haneem describe as making black and brown bodies feel excluded.

    Photograph by Haneem Christian

    Sara and Haneem were part of a 3 month mentorship program called AREA3 CPT ’17. As part of this program young creators in Cape Town were given the opportunity to be introduced to a studio space and work collaboratively under the guidance of Gabrielle Kannemeyer and Imraan Christian. This took place at the AREA3 store on Bree Street. Inspired by the family connections made at AREA3, they invited the other young creatives to be part of their photographic series. They spent a day “reimagining and consciously reclaiming space, and seeking freedom in spaces that was never built for us.”

    When searching for Bree Street online, the results of my Google search presented me with restaurant options, bars, and a bicycle store. In an interview with Sara and Haneem, they presented Bree Street with the hipster layers peeled away. Reflecting on their time spent at AREA3, “For a group of young people of colour to physically occupy space in Bree street in itself was extraordinary. We found a home in a world that never had space for young black creative kids. We had created a safer space for everyone to feel comfortable…” Haneem  explains.

    Choosing to grab hold of the torch that started the decolonial fire within university spaces and a critical re-engagement with public space and institutions, their series sees young creatives of colour occupy Bree Street armed with skateboards, bicycles, a kite, soccer balls and cameras. “We had succeeded in shifting the landscape of Bree Street to a space where young brown kids now feel confident existing in the space and occupying it, playing games that would never leave the communities they originate from,” Sara and Haneem explain in their write up for their project. Their core premise is the disruption of whiteness within the city centre.

    Photograph by Thandiwe Gula-Ndebele

    When asked about the importance of young people taking on the politics of space, particularly public space, Sara responded that, “Engaging with the politics of space – especially in a deeply segregated city like Cape Town – plays a pivotal role in shifting the narrative and the landscape of that space to a more inclusive one. It’s not merely about physically reclaiming our spaces, but about reclaiming our identities and narratives within those spaces.”

    The activities involved in putting this photographic series together puts forward a form of infrastructural development, in which we see the combination of their objects, people and spaces towards a more inclusive infrastructure.

    Photograph by Thandiwe Gula-Ndebele
    Photograph by Haneem Christian
    Photography by Haneem Christian

    The team:

    Creative Director & photographer – Haneem Christian

    Creative Director – Sara Lagardien

    Photographer – Thandiwe Gula-Ndebele

    Imraan Christian

    Ra-ees Saiet

    Waseem Noordien

    Justin February

    Aidan Groenewald

    Joshua Pascoe

    Antonio Druchen

    Raeez Kilshaw

    Azhar Abrahams

    Alexandra Truter

    Tiisetso Moreki

    Kalo Canterbury

    Koketso Buthelezi

    Kiyan Thornton

    Olwethu Shakur Matiwana

    Mathew Bull

    Conway October

    Kabelo Masipa

    Luxolo Witvoet

    Zenande Mtati

    Pabalelo Clayton

    Rendani Nemakonde

  • Eric Gyamfi // photography that creates historical space for LGBTQ communities in Ghana

    Eric Gyamfi // photography that creates historical space for LGBTQ communities in Ghana

    With continued resistance from MPs in Ghana to the pressure to decriminalise homosexuality, and a general attitude against those who do not identify as heterosexual, Ghanaian photographer Eric Gyamfi is producing work that engages with these complications.

    “It’s in our everyday life that all these complex identities come together to make us who we are,” says Eric Gyamfi in an interview with New Town Next.

    Living in a country where homosexuality is viewed as “un-African”, Gyamfi’s response has been to photograph the everyday lives of those who are not heterosexual. Through this documentation of LGBTQ communities in Ghana, he emphasizes the mundane to demonstrate how being homosexual is not a sexual orientation that should be viewed as “unnatural”. More than this, his work builds an archive of images that allow those whom he photographed to occupy historical space. In a 2015 series he documented the violence that LGBTQ people have had to face. This series saw people giving responses that continued the abuse by stating that this was well deserved. Aiming to productively channel the hurt from these responses, his series “Just Like Us” is a direct attempt to address homophobic attitudes that permeate in Ghana.

    Henry performing in drag, 2016

    “It’s a way of establishing that there are queer people here. Not just for the rest of the population but to provide a space for us in history,” says Eric Gyamfi in an interview with New Town Next.

    “Just Like Us” does not highlight sexuality, but rather shows the people he photographed partaking in everyday activities, and in doing so challenging stereotypical and problematic notions of ‘what queerness looks like’ or ‘should look like’. To put this series together Gyamfi spent weeks living with or in close proximity to queer individuals or couples. This allowed him to capture candid moments of romance, friendship and all things in between.

  • John Edmunds // The emotive and visual signifiers of Black masculinities, sexuality and intimacy

    The young photographer, John Edmunds, explores the emotive and visual signifiers of Black masculinities, sexuality and intimacy within particular US contexts. This is evident in his do-rag series he produced earlier this year. Tracing the style of men tying these nylon cloths around their heads to the history of American slavery were women wore cloths around their heads to protect them from the heat, to the use of headwraps as a way to preserve hairstyles. Edmunds photographs possess a softness that is in conversation with this history.  His compositional choices present the do-rags as having a royal quality to them, with the flow of the fabric mimicking the train of an evening dress. This is echoed by some of the titles for his images, including The Prince.

    The Prince, 2017.

    Edmunds graduated from Yale with his MFA Photography degree last year. Style has played an important role in how he has conceptualized his photographic projects. Branching out from this  premise, he focuses on symbols of Black American culture and his own identity as a Queer, Black man. The 2014 series Edmunds produced for ADULT magazine reflects on this last theme directly.

    Body, 2013

    This series looks at attraction, intimacy, race, and sexuality, as well as provides a critical eye on the need to peel open the complexities of masculinities. By tapping into the emotional depth that can be achieved through photography and addressing the politics of the gaze, Edmunds presents portraits of friends and strangers, with most individuals photographed alone, but never appearing lonely. With these individuals being photographed in domestic spaces, Edmunds heightens a feeling of affection between those photographed and the camera. These images force viewers to come face-to-face with their own ideologies that govern the filters through which they interpret beauty, intimacy, and strength.

    Check out Edmunds’ website to follow his work.

    Two Brother (Jamaican Queens, NY), 2012.

  • Lebohang Kganye // living memory

    Looking for a way to live in her late mother’s memories, Johannesburg-based artist Lebohang Kganye produced the work Ke Lefa Laka which was awarded the Contemporary African Photography (CAP) Prize. Ke Lefa Laka translates to ‘my inheritance’, and this was the starting point for her work. By embodying her mother through images she is able to combine the past, the present and memories of her mother without any chronological order being made to dominate the work. Kganye put on her mother’s clothes and inserted herself into photographs of her mother before she passed away, allowing herself to occupy two moments at once. Here she quite literally inserts her body into images to live in her mother’s memories.

    Primarily a photographer, her work also incorporates sculpture and performance and focuses on the thematics of memory, the archive, narrative, storytelling and how photography relates to these.

    ‘Setupung sa kwana hae II’

    Recognizing that family photographs are a documentation of personal and collective narratives, and how they are displayed projects a particular way in which those narratives unfold, Kganye also addresses how their construction can be performative and used to channel ideals around “family-ness”.

    While Ke Lefa Laka was produced in 2013, it highlights one of the key aspects her practice, which is to make connections between macro level political and social issues and personal/familial narratives. By visiting places that her family had lived and by finding family photographs she was able to explore the stories told to her by her grandmother, and uncover the story of her grandfather, mother, clan names, and her own story. These stories involved the multiple times her family had to move due to apartheid laws and social conditions, and how her family surname changed with these moves. This work culminated in a reflection on larger political and social conditions by highlighting how the personal is political. This premise is carried through her artistic practice.

    ‘Ka mose wa malomo kwana 44 I’
    ‘The last supper’

     

  • Monica Kim Garza // “You a real ass woman ‘n I like it”

    Monica Kim Garza. The Mexican-Korean artist’s paintings and mixed media work depict women with fuller figures partaking in activities such as sun tanning, riding bicycles and lifting barbells bare-breasted. Often the women in her images appear to be going about these activities with little care for the viewer’s attention, and other times their eyes confront the viewer directly. Painted in all shades of brown, Garza’s subtle shading and bold black outlines make the female figures in her works the focus of each image despite their little care for the viewer’s attention.

    Her focus on the naked female figure came from drawing inspiration from Native American as well as Inca art and culture. Her father had a deep love and curiosity about these cultures, and Garza spent time in Peru, which is a country which has a rich culture and history with the Incas.

    Not there for any viewer’s voyeuristic satisfaction, Garza paints her characters with personalities that come across in their facial expressions and the poses she chooses for them. Her work embraces sexual freedom with no relation to pornographic stereotypes, but simply for the empowering feeling that comes with ownership of multiple forms of pleasure.

    Rough brushstrokes reveal the layers of colour that build up on her canvases, creating the distinctive texture that makes her work so recognizable. Her Mexican and Korean roots share a space in her work, with her often pairing Spanish and Korean translations side by side in a painting. Besides these textual references, they also share visual signifiers such as a painting of La Virgen de Guadalupe [title of the Virgin Mary associated with a image kept in the Basilica of Our Lady of Guadalupe in México City] hanging on a bedroom wall and women in the kitchen making kimchi [a spicy Korean side dish made with fermented vegetables, usually cabbage].

    Self-care comes across as the centre of Garza’s work. She presents women with well-rounded lives – women who exercise, go to the beach, eat a variety of foods, text, spend time with their friends and alone, enjoy sexual encounters and paint.

    The message behind her practice can be summarized by the words she painted on one of her artworks, “You a real ass woman ‘n I like it”.

  • Black(s) to the Future // a site for black creation from Paris

    Founded in 2015, the transmedia platform Black(s) to the Future began with the idea to have a site for Black creation from France. Co-founder Mawena Yehouessi, born in Benin and now living in France, explains that this was important because “France, and Europe in general, is very different from South Africa and the US in the way we relate to communities, and the relationship between Blackness and Africa, the Afro Diasporia, the Afropean etc.”

    In order to understand what she means by this, Mawena explained that the black community in France is quite diverse within itself because some people are descendents of slaves from the Indies, and others come from Africa. There have also been multiple waves of immigration, particularly from Africa. What adds another layer of complexity to this, Mawena explains, is the fact that the state claims to be colourblind. “In France it is impossible to ask someone on official documents whether he or she is Black or Latina or Arabic or white. These notions do not exist at all. But only on a state or official level. But in everyday life there is an obvious recognition of that fact that you are white French or Arabic or Black. There is a real hypocrisy between the two treatments…But like everywhere, in everyday life, the fact that you are Black means something.”

    Mawena’s group of friends, who are artists, were starting to bring these kinds of racial issues and cultural identities back through their work. “It would be in details like historical elements, references…and in the use of different of materials.” Being surrounded by this new wave of creativity, the question was how to make a specific space for it.

    In the beginning it was dedicated to visual art, and philosophical questions such as ‘What does it mean to be Black in France?’, ‘What does it mean to be African in France?’ and ‘What does it mean to be from elsewhere?’

    She was curious about the new discourses and new narrations possible with the hybrid identity of being Black and French.

    “When you are Black French you relate a lot to black American. The reference you have in university books will be really towards the English speaking world. And then if you go back to the French speaking world you have everything related to Négritude during the independence of the colonies – Cezaire, Fanon, Senghor. These were structured to a specific time. We don’t have contemporary thoughts. We have African thoughts. We have English contemporary thoughts. We have so few French or European Black contemporary thoughts.”

    The idea or the challenge was to constitute a kind of archive. The second statement came from the idea that in France there is little respect for self-made man politics or ideas. At the same time people who surrounded her and were part of particular schools of thought but were also deeply involved and invested in pop culture. “From different ranges, from music to movies to the books we were reading. We love all these ideas. We would read essays. We could go to museums. We also loved to party hard,” she explains.

    Playing on Mark Dery’s 1994 essay Black to the Future in which the term Afrofuturism was first used, Black(s) to the Future includes artists, writers, philosophy students and musicians. Dery framed Afrofuturism as a term which explores black expression and suffering through a re-imagining of a future.

    Black(s) to the Future combines all of these considerations, and is “nurtured by Afrofuturism” as a methodology and an ethics. The word nurture evokes a connection to caring for, including emotional and, in this case, intellectual forms of care.

    This nurturing can be seen through one of the events they host called the Black(s) to the Future Festival. “The idea for this festival is that this is a pluri-disciplanary festival,” Mawena explains. It includes music, talks, artworks, and performances. The second edition of this festival took place in mid September, and they are hoping to continue to grow over the years. The importance of this festival becomes clear when Mawena left me with her reflections on the festival…”maybe there is a new community at stake.”

    Check out the Black(s) to the Future website to keep up with what they have planned.