Taking place in the Senegalese capital, “The Wake”, Dakar Biennale’s (Dak’Art) 15th edition, tries to focus on the efforts Africa has made to trace a new path of social development. With around 3,000 artists and a budget of 2,9 million dollars, one of the oldest African biennials, which takes place between November 7th and December 7th, casts both light and shadows.
From the global implications of George Floyd’s murder and the influence of the Black Lives Matter movement, Kali Gross’ book “Vengeance Feminism: The Power of Black Women’s Fury in Lawless Times”, to the ravages of the global pandemic in Senegalese Île Saint-Louis and the fishermen’s demonstrations in Guet Ndar. These are just a few of a wider range of events showing how black consciences are experiencing a new awakening, asking for their rights and dignity. With Dak’Art being a platform for meeting and confrontation, a space for validating and legitimising contemporary African artistic creation, this year’s Biennale tries to map how artists see this awakening and how they are part of it. The Dakar Biennale is also a framework for the mediation and promotion of African aesthetics that are, by essence, complex and even mixed. And it happens between lights and shadows – in a historical moment that both observes neo-colonialism still being strong, and where most African countries celebrate 64 years of independence.
Because of the huge, not easy-to-manage spaces of Ancien Palais de Justice and Musée de la Civilisation Noire, where the Biennale takes place, the quality of the exhibitions may be uneven. Also, there is a clear attempt to include a lot of artists who, as part of the diaspora, have now become Europeanised or Americanised. And who, sponsored by the big galleries, have lost contact with their roots and give nothing back to their countries of origin in terms of intellectual solidarity and a tool for true emancipation, or for training a great local artistic scene. Yet this scene does exist, but thanks to the effort of artists who have not left the country and invested their own resources, while being quite ignored by the “majors” of the art world.
Intellectual honesty
It’s impossible to mention every artwork, but, in our opinion, the most interesting moments can be found in a selection of works that own intellectual honesty and truly talk about African culture. For the heritage, go to Ancien Palais de Justice, for the set-up and concepts – “Haptic Library” in the Ancien Palais de Justice, part of Archive Ensemble’s research formation, comes to the rescue. But it is “Publishing Practices” that is one of the most interesting projects. Inside it, practitioners and storytellers, from different longitudes and with various languages, ancestries, and sensitivities, are all moved by a communal need to imagine and know the world differently. Its commitment is deeply rooted in the critical effort to disrupt and overturn Eurocentric, patriarchal, and colonial epistemological paradigms by creating cracks in dominant narratives and generating ruptures in consolidated ontologies.
Since a variety of Dakar venues take part in the official Biennale programme, one of the most notable exhibitions is at Selebe Yoon Gallery. “Tarana”, created by Senegalese painter Arébénor Basséne, takes inspiration from ancient civilizations, particularly those of the great African and Mediterranean empires.
Within the project, there is a work worth attention – “Wake work for our great-grandmothers, grandmothers, mothers and those who came before them and are still present” by Ivorian artist Keren Lasme, who works with Abidjan-based gallery Farah Fakhri. The work is an attempt to answer “What did it mean for a black woman to be an artist in our grandmothers’ time?”. As Lasme herself explains, it is a prayer, an altar, an invocation, an act of care, and a sacred site of remembrance. It is an invitation to search for and unearth the creative life and genius of our matriarchs, who used materials at their reach to plant their creative dreams, who freed their creative spirit in spaces of enclosure and managed to pass it on to us.
The human being in front of the immensity of nature
Just like Cheikh Anta Diop, a Senegalese historian and anthropologist, always stressed – Black people have contributed greatly to world culture, including poetry and philosophy. Their strong connection to nature has allowed them to observe stars, plants, and animals with particular attention. For instance, the big painting by Malian artist Abdou Ouologuem “Vibration” offers a universal reflection on the smallness of the human being in front of the immensity of nature, as well as on their finiteness in front of the infinity of the cosmos. Or the sculptor, Oumar Ball, who by assembling various metals creates a metaphor of human beings seen as animals, struggling to conquer the world but destroying it in the end. Sadly, this is the story of colonialism in Africa, too.
Examining the past, present, and future repercussions of slavery
The Musée de la Civilisation Noire is home to 3 pavilions of Senegal, USA and Cabo Verde. Paradoxically, the first comes as rather conventional by offering just a selection of “postcards” one may find in a touristic flea market. Although the curatorial idea was to pay homage to Cheikh Anta Diop’s legacy, the result is more linked to design. Cabo Verde’s pavilion is a compelling trip into the identity of the former Portuguese colony and its struggle for independence, and whose leader, Amílcar Cabral, used to live in Dakar back in 1973. The Cape Verdean exhibition, “Atlantites”, tells a story of a country, which gained its freedom thanks to people like Captain Ambrósio, who appears in this cycle of textile artworks. And which was born just after the forced migration of slaves into this archipelago from different parts of Africa, to then experience migration caused by soil poverty and water scarcity. This roots and its diaspora emerge from colourful textile paintings that balance neo-expressionism, symbolism, and poetic realism. The US pavilion concludes the projects at Musée de la Civilisation Noire as a video works exhibition with seven Afro-American artists, examining the past, present, and future repercussions of slavery, as well as the Sufi tradition in the local Muslim faith and its link with the dance and the Ocean. Considering the latter, Chelsea Odufu’s very charming and touching video “Moved by Spirit” immerses the observer in a mystic atmosphere between faith and nature.
Since a variety of Dakar venues take part in the official Biennale programme, one of the most notable exhibitions is at Selebe Yoon Gallery. “Tarana”, created by Senegalese painter Arébénor Basséne, takes inspiration from ancient civilizations, particularly those of the great African and Mediterranean empires. The use of various materials, such as paper, gum arabic, ink, henna, wood, and natural pigments from the Dakar region, Basséne, highlights forgotten stories through artistic remnants. Basséne’s works range from abstraction to figuration, with landscapes devoid of historical references and human forms in motion, evoking traditional Diola dances from the Casamance region.
A real awakening?
Salimata Diop, the 2024 Dakar Biennale’s artistic director, declares: “‘The Wake’ is an invitation to restore the fluidity of this movement, recognising that the archipelago is not the island and that a wave always impels a flow, and always has a wake, as well as a direction. The artists of Africa and the diaspora are then in the place and in the function where the world desperately needs them: sentinels of the imagination, pioneers of a vital metamorphosis, they dig the arborescent beds of new rivers, forming the silt and entering the sea”.
The Biennale materialises then a positive Africa which aim is to play its part in the concert of nations. But apart from the official declarations – the Dak’Art serves as the mirror of the great contradictions that both the city of Dakar and the whole Senegal have been living in since 1960, and that have worsened since then due to the lack of real civil progress that could awake the awareness of being free and dignity in the Senegalese people.
Among the many principles, from ecology to equality discussed at the exhibitions, only a few are translated into reality outside the Biennale’s artworks – be it the aforementioned diaspora, the poor conditions in which a large part of the Dakar population lives, the exploitation of the country’s resources by large international corporations, or the corruption rates which still remains high among the authorities. The dialogue and the collaboration between artists and politicians are missing, especially considering that Senegal does not have a ministry dedicated to culture.
There are interesting and honest works to admire at the Dak’Art this year. However, it has to be admitted that the general level of the Biennale and its logistical situation reflect yet another moment of neo-colonialism. With the still deeply-rooted influences of “Western” countries – the political complicities and exploitation of local resources, in a way, we are “empoisoning” African culture with the fake mirage of consumerism and technological “progress”. While the Biennale is something rightfully important for Senegal and Africa, we cannot hide from what is not working within it, otherwise we are just accomplices of those networks that create in African people the illusion they are free, while they are still not.
