Art biennial for Lagos?

The art landscape of Lagos is getting greener, so suggests, a newsletter being circulated by The Akete Art Foundation.

 The Foundation has annonunced what it calls "the first edition of Lagos Biennial." With a theme, Living on the Edge, the biennial is scheduled to hold from 14 October to 22 December, 2017, at six venues across the city of Lagos.

Facade part of the demolished Ilojo Bar at Tinubu, Central Lagos Island.

 Lagos is good enough to be a “hub for critical thought and international artistic exchanges,” says Folakunle Oshun, the founding artistic director of the Lagos Biennial.

“The city should embody a more globalized approach to the subject of art and should not just be driven by
Afrocentric ideologies but rather it should embrace the unifying simplicity of the human experience.”

 Over 40 exhibiting artists are expected from 20 countries such as France, Iran, Mozambique, Kenya, Norway, Afghanistan, Germany, Switzerland, South Korea, Ethiopia, Angola, Senegal, Greece, United Kingdom, Sweden, Ghana, Spain, Egypt, Russia, and Nigeria.

 Curators for the biennial consists of Amira Paree, a Paris-based Egyptian/Dutch artist; Perpetuum Mobilε, a curatorial platform co-directed by Ivor Stodolsky and Marita Muukkonen; which brings together art, engaged practice and enquiry; and Oshun as Artistic Director.

 The Akete Art Foundation is a not-for-profit cultural organization founded in 2016 and registered with the Corporate Affairs Commission in 2017 with the main objective of promoting contemporary art in Nigeria through the staging of the Lagos Biennial once in two years.