The Fondation pour le Développement de la Culture Contemporaine Africaine (FDCCA) is putting together the continent’s first traveling exhibition. “Prête-moi ton rêve” (Lend me Your Dream) will bring together 30 of the world’s famous African artists from around 20 countries and seven African cities: Casablanca, Dakar, Abidjan, Lagos, Addis Ababa, Cape Town and Marrakech. The year-long exhibition displays works of various forms including paintings, sculpture, photography, fabric installations and more. The continental exhibition placed under the sign of South-South collaboration was inaugurated in Casablanca on 18 June 2019.
Some of the artists include Jane Alexander, Soly Cissé, Abdoulaye Konaté, Jems Koko Bi, William Kentridge, Chéri Samba, Barthélémy Toguo, Nnenna Okoré, Ouattara Watts.
A call for the repatriation of African arts.
According to QZ, one of the most anticipated works to see in Dakar’s Museum of Black Civilizations would be the giant matchsticks by Senegalese artist, Mansour Ciss Kanakassy. The matchsticks, some of them lit, others yet to be ignited represent the Berlin conference of 1884-1885 and the eventual scramble for Africa. The Museum is opening a dialogue between the new and the old by incorporating older artifacts from its collection e.g. 200-year old bronze sculptures from Benin, side by side with similar pieces from the contemporary artists. Altogether, this merges the idea of pan-Africanism and a collective history and origin of Africans —a concept that the borders drawn after the Berlin Conference came to disrupt.