As more African countries are getting due representation at the Venice Biennale, the Republic of Benin will debut their first-ever national pavilion. The inaugural national pavilion of the Republic of Benin at the 60th edition of the Venice Biennale, which will take place from April 20th to November 24th, 2024, will be curated by Azu Nwagbogu.
Azu Nwagbogu is the founder and director of the Lagos-based non-profit African Artists’ Foundation (AAF). He will be assisted by Yassine Lassissi, artistic director of Lagos’s La Galerie Nationale du Bénin, and architect Franck Houndégla. The pavilion will be commissioned by José Pliya, playwright and general director of La Galerie Nationale.
Nwagbogu was appointed curator of the pavilion by a selection committee that included administrators of the National Gallery of Benin, the Minister of Tourism, Culture, and Arts, Jean Michel Abimbola, and was chaired by the Republic of Benin’s President, Patrice Talon.
Patrice Talon says:
“We are delighted to have Azu Nwagbogu as the curator of the Benin National Pavilion. His unique background, vision and expertise in the field of art curation makes him the perfect candidate to showcase Bénin’s cultural heritage and contemporary art to the world.”
This announcement from the Republic of Benin puts its upcoming debut in Venice within Talon’s broader cultural policy agenda, which is focused on efforts to recover the numerous artifacts stolen from the Kingdom of Benin by British soldiers during an infamous 1897 raid.
According to the Art Newspaper, Nwagbogu has been a vocal advocate for reparations by addressing the issue at international panels and forums in recent years. In 2020, he guest-edited an issue of Art Africa that emphasized AAF’s own efforts to “its gaze to the burning political, civic and aesthetic ramifications of restitution”. In 2010, he started the Lagos Photo Festival. From 2018 – 2019, he served as Interim Director and Chief Curator of the Zeitz Museum of Modern Art in South Africa.
It is believed that Nwagbogu’s vision for the project is to contribute to the construction of the intellectual architecture that will allow Benin to sustain and deploy the great artistic potential that springs from its land and has traversed its various diasporas.
Benin joins the growing list of African countries to participate in the largest exhibition of contemporary art in the world. Cameroon and Namibia made their respective debuts at the 59th Venice Biennale in 2022 while Ghana and Madagascar made their debuts in 2019.
