think so, however, whilst South Africa’s independence in 1994 marked the end of an era from a system of racial segregation (known as Apartheid), in Africa, heralding the complete liberation of the continent, this colonial legacy is still alive within the global arts today. What hope is there of breaking this legacy of domination?
Let us examine this contentious scenario.
In 1995, Africa ‘95 was the first Post-Independence International Conference for artists, art critics and cultural practitioners from Egypt, Nigeria and Sub-Saharan Africa to be held at the Courthauld Institute in London. Here, this writer represented Zimbabwe.
The aim of this conference was to engage African arts practitioners with the rest of the world.
However, in the last 16 years very little has changed on the international art arena within the global art discourse.
In AD 2011 Africa’s artists are still being looked upon as “the exotic other”, and in many instances, during international arts exposes Africa, the second-largest continent in the world with a population of a billion (2009).
Approximately 15 percent of the world’s population, is represented in a single pavilion during international art biennales.
I often wonder how the second largest continent on this earth can be represented in a small annexed pavilion away from the main Euro-American auditoriums and still expect to be “globally visible”.
Where in this global art discourse, has there been any significant and sustained acknowledgement of Africa’s 54 sovereign countries, each producing a myriad of exceptional, individual art?
The culture of international biennales is an anathema to African art. These massive publicity art events receive more press, television and inter-net coverage than any other art occasion in the world.
But whilst these glamorous events purport to privilege art and artists, they in effect privilege the interests of sponsors, art sales people, international business magnets, western governments, western tourism and other powerful institutions of the great Euro-American art enterprise, with the exclusion of Africa.
International Visual art biennales are perhaps the most effective vehicles of the qualification, commodification and commercialisation of the visual culture that exists in the global art world, and as such, are an important platform for our cultural visibility.
However, arbitrarily, biennales tend to package art according to pre-conceived national flavours of African art and international expectations with a cliché’d, monocled predictability – “The exotic other”.
As a trained curator, personally one would prefer to work with a team of experts when selecting art for an exhibition, because no single vision, or view point can give an objective assessment of the current state of contemporary, indigenous art.
This means that professional African artists need to be more vocal about who we need to be addressing, who and what we are.
As our artistic efforts, visions and provocations seem constantly in danger of being deracinated, ignored or trivialised by this new breed of cultural mercenaries called global curators.
For contemporary African art to be effective, artworks should not be selected in order to fulfill a curator’s vision, but must be selected in a manner which incorporates the many realities of culture, space, time and position of these artists’ works.
Hopefully, the art will then speak beyond and outlive its immediate time and space, as well as give an objective portrayal of the best visual production of the respective African countries.
The aim of international biennales, the Venice biennale included, has always been to present art “in a national context, in a global arena”.
But whilst the global arena can accommodate world cup soccer players, cricketers, flower growers or super models, visual arts is a different ball game.
Given the above, how on earth can a single curator package African or Zimbabwean art for the global market?
There are as many Zimbabwean realities, as there are artists or groups or movements and schools of thought, as there are individuals. It is therefore folly to essentialise culture in this way.
Artists from Africa should organise themselves locally7, and represent themselves globally, given that biennales are intended for the artists and writers, not for gallery bureaucrats and curator’s myopic vision.
Fulfilling a curator’s vision of representing states of play within global art discourse will not reflect your independent views or visions as liberated African artists.
In a recent critical evaluation of the phenomenal rise of self appointed career curators in the mediation of contemporary art in Africa, especially in the last decade, (2000-2010), has been a contentious issue for many professional artists practicing on African soil prior to this new breed of “cultural mercenaries”.
One may ask themselves who are these independent global curators? Who appoints and remunerates them?
Does anyone peer review them? Whose interests do they serve?
Do they serve the countries best needs? Or do they pander to Euro-American cliques? Are they accountable to the artists?
What precisely qualifies them to single-handedly, accurately identify the state of play within global art discourse?
No single vision can correctly make an objective assessment of the state of visual arts at any given time, it is therefore vital to bring together a panel of experts in visual arts in order to make an effective assessment.
To the indigenous Zimbabwean artist I pose these questions:
1. Who are we making our art for?
2. Is it to share with indigenous Africans on this continent?
3. Is it for the generic audiences of the international art world of the global north? Or is it for us and the rest of the world?
If all three questions apply, why are Zimbabweans no longer as visible on the so-called international art arena of today? The answers are simple. We are not unified as African artists.
Zimbabwe and Africa
At this stage in our cultural history there is validity in exploring the relationships between Zimbabwean art and artists, and the art and artists elsewhere in Africa in the emerging Post-Colonial contexts.
This is an important all-encompassing project if we are to acknowledge and address the consequences of colonialism on the art and visual culture of our continent and the unequal power relations between our former colonisers and us.
Today, as much as we may want to ignore it, this past informs our present cultural state, globally.
Among the most obvious things about Post-Colonial Africa is that there are a lot of artists producing a lot of works of contemporary art.
Moreover, the volume, details and complexity of this art production makes it possible to place discourse about art in Africa in the same sense, scale and chronology as discourse about art in Europe or America.
Art is one of the highest forms of expression of a given culture.
The culture is US, and we are people, not objects to be displayed or sold from time to time to our ex-colonial benefactors.
Culture can be revealed therefore, as both an exclusive creation of an indigenous people and an instrument of socio-economical liberation.
Western white-wash
It is also debatable whether presenting your own country in Venice or other international biennales enables one to represent themselves on their own terms.
This is because western audiences are well schooled in the dominant art discourses and evidently African curators and artists have to take this into account.
Western-modelled biennales and neo-African curators together with our Afro-centric dreams are an unholy alliance.
Our so-called self appointed “independent international art curators” of dubious qualifications allow themselves to be re-colonised even to the extent of recreating their own fragmentations and divisions into “Francophone” and “Anglophone” Africa. And then there are those in our beloved African Diaspora, who do not know their loyalties lie.
One is well aware of international scholars’ and race relations courts: Here, many third world students are passed on the grounds of fear of arbitration and “good relations” in our esteemed British colleges.
An unwritten fact, but widely understood is that a large number of third world students, especially in the arts and humanities are awarded a pass in their thesis in order to avoid arbitration in race relation courts. those are largely the “new” African curators of today.
As we approach the Venice Biennale to be held in Italy in June 2011.
It is now time for Zimbabwean and other contemporary visual artists from Africa to raise their voices and be heard as progressive indigenous Africans with languages of their own.
l Dr Tony Monda holds a PhD in Post-Modern Art Theory and Philosophy and a DBA Doctorate in Business Administration of Post-colonial Art and Heritage Studies. He is a practicing artist, visual designer, corporate image consultant and art critic.

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