The 13th edition of the Bamako Encounters – African Biennale of Photography is on view at various venues in Bamako, Mali from 8 December 2022–8 February 2023.
Image courtesy of the Bamako Encounters
Founded in 1994 and organized by the Ministry of Culture of Mali with the support of the Institut Français, the Bamako Encounters – African Biennial of Photograph which is also called the Recontres de Bamako is a meeting point for African photographers, photographers working on the continent and the professionals they collaborate with. The internationally reowed space is aimed at promoting the various trends in contemporary photography and video in Africa by creating international exchange among artists, the public, curators, commissioners, the media and collectors.
The Biennale is the first and principal event dedicated to contemporary photography and new imagery in Africa. It works with local and international partners (museums, galleries, foundations, art centres, public places, French cultural centres, art schools, photography training centres, cultural associations) to present a series of exhibits around Bamako.
This time Bamako Encounters holds its 13th edition with the title Maa ka Maaya ka ca a yere kono. This calls artists, curators, scholars, activists, and people of all walks of life to reflect collectively on these multiplicities of being and differences, on expanding beyond the notion of a single being, and on embracing compound, layered and fragmented identities as much as layered, complex, non-linear understandings of space and time.
The Bamako Encounters writes that this year’s exhibition will pay a powerful tribute to the spaces in between, to that which defies definition, to phases of transition, to being this and that or neither and both, to becoming, and to difference and divergence in all their shades.
The exhibition references Aimé Césaire’s seminal poem “Unmaking and Remaking the Sun” in five chapters and relating to the theme of this 13th edition and the artistic selection.
Chapter 1
dwelling made of not knowing which way to turn
— On Land, Placeness and Spaceness —
Chapter 2
dwelling made of fan fingers
— On Multiplicities of Identities, Beings and Becomings —
Chapter 3
dwelling made of mustard seeds
— Of Living Cultures, Presences and Continuities of Heritages —
Chapter 4
dwelling made of fallen angel feathers
— On Dispersals, Connectedness and the Performativity
of Languages and Histories —
Chapter 5
dwelling made of rainstorms of the deluge
— Of Flows, Transitions and Supranaturality —
Selected artists for the 13th edition
Babajide Adeniyi-Jones (Nigeria), Ixmucané Aguilar (Guatemala/Germany), Said Afifi (Morocco/ France), Baff Akoto (Ghana/UK), Ishola Akpo (Benin), Annie-Marie Akussah (Ghana), Hunguana Americo (Mozambique), Leo Asemota (Nigeria/UK), Jess Atieno (Kenya), Myriem Omar Awadi (La Reunion), Salih Basheer (Sudan), Shiraz Bayjoo (Mauritius/UK), Amina Benbouchta (Morocco), Hakim Benchekroun (Morocco), Maite Moseka Botembe (DRC), Rehema Chachage (Tanzania/Austria), Uiler Costa Santos (Brazil), Monica De Miranda (Angola/Portugal), Fatoumata Diabaté (Mali), Aicha Diallo (Mali), Amsatou Diallo (Mali), Nene Aïssatou Diallo (Guinea/USA), Anna Binta Diallo (Senegal/Canada), Mélissa Oummou Diallo (Guinea/France), Binta Diaw (Senegal/Italy), Adji Dieye (Senegal/Italy/ Switzerland), Imane Djamil (Morocco), Sènami Donoumassou (Benin), Abdessamad El Montassir (Morocco), Fairouz El Tom (Sudan/ Switzerland), Adama Delphine Fawundu (Sierra Leone/USA), Raisa Galofre (Colombia/Germany), Gherdai Hassell (Bermuda/UK/China), Sana Ginwalla (Zambia), Thembinkosi Hlatshwayo (South Africa), Letitia Huckaby (USA), Timothy Yanick Hunter (Jamaica/Canada), Anique Jordan (Trinidad/Canada), Gladys Kalichini (Zambia), Hamedine Kane (Senegal/Mauritius), Atiyyah Khan (South Africa), Gulshan Khan (South Africa), Seif Kousmate (Morocco), Mohammed Laouli (Morocco), Maya Louhichi (Tunisia/France), Mallory Lowe Mpoka (Cameroon/Canada), Nyawose Luvuyo Equiano (South Africa), Nourhan Maayouf (Egypt), Louisa Marajo (Martinique), Clarita Maria (Zambia), Billie McTernan (Ghana), Marie-Claire Messouma Manlanbien (Guadeloupe/ Ivory Coast), Arsène Mpiana Monkwe (DRC), Sethembile Msezane (South Africa), Ebti Nabag (Sudan/Canada), Elijah Ndoumbe (Cameroon/France), Lucia Nhamo (Zimbabwe), Samuel Nja Kwa (Cameroon/France), Nyancho NwaNri (Gambia/Nigeria), Adee Roberson (USA), Sofia Rodrigues (Angola/ Portugal), Fethi Sahraoui (Algeria), Muhammad Salah Abdul-Aziz (Sudan), Neville Starling (Zimbabwe/SA), Eve Tagny (Cameroon/Canada), René Tavares (São Tomé and Príncipe), Sackitey Tesa (Ghana), Helena Uambembe (Angola/ SA), David Uzochukwu (Nigeria/ Austria).
