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The artist Ana Mendieta (1948–1985) is remembered as the creator of powerful works expressing a vibrant and unflinching second-wave feminist sensibility. In Radical Virtuosity, art historian Genevieve Hyacinthe offers a new view of Mendieta, connecting her innovative artwork to the art, cultural aesthetics and concerns, feminisms, and sociopolitical messages of the black Atlantic.

Mendieta left Cuba as a preteen, fleeing the Castro regime, and spent years in U.S. foster care. Her sense of exile, Hyacinthe argues, colors her work. Hyacinthe examines the development of Mendieta's performative artworks—particularly the Silueta series (1973–1985), which documented the silhouette of her body in the earth over time (a series “without end,” Mendieta said)—and argues that these works were shaped by Mendieta's appropriation and reimagining of Afro-Cuban ritual. Mendieta's effort to create works that invited audience participation, Hyacinthe says, signals her interest in forging connections with the marginalized, particularly those of the black Atlantic and Global South. Hyacinthe describes the “counter entropy” of Mendieta's small-scale earthworks (contrasting them with more massive works created by Robert Smithson and other male artists); considers the resonance of Mendieta's work with the contemporary practices of black Atlantic female artists including Wangechi Mutu, Renee Green, and Damali Abrams; and connects Mendieta's artistic and political expressions to black Atlantic feminisms of such popular artists as Princess Nokia.

Mendieta's life and work are often overshadowed in popular perception by her early and tragic death—at thirty-six, she plunged from the window of the thirty-fourth floor Greenwich Village apartment she shared with her husband, the artist Carl Andre. (Andre was charged with her murder and acquitted.) Hyacinthe's account—profusely illustrated, with many images in color—reclaims Mendieta's work and legacy for its artistic significance.

Art --- art [discipline] --- African diaspora --- Mendieta, Ana

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With the exhibition Vanishing Points 2014–2020 at REITER, the Ghanaian artist Ibrahim Mahama (*1987) has his first solo show in a German gallery. For his large, site-specific installation, the artist has arranged a hundred old wheelbarrows, which he collected from workers in Ghana, giving them new ones in return. The rusty, worn wheelbarrows bear the obvious marks of daily hard labor and can be understood as a symbol of that. They also represent the construction that manifests in architecture throughout the history of the artist’s homeland. At the same time the work can also be regarded in the context of his project Parliament of Ghosts, which was on display in Tamale, Ghana, in 2020. It is a forum for debate that also continues with the idea of social sculpture. Both projects in Tamale and Leipzig are documented in the book.

Art --- installations [visual works] --- colonization --- migration [function] --- community art --- globalization --- African diaspora --- Mahama, Ibrahim --- Ghana

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This book brings together a selection of photographs by artist Mekhitar Garabedian, documenting the warehouse of his late father's company, Melantex, which exported second-hand clothing from Belgium to the Middle East, Asia, and Africa. The images inspired a one-year sculptural intervention by Garabedian, commissioned by the Antwerp Public Art Collection. 

*Import-Export, Friperie* tells a compelling personal and collective story of how displacement can be turned into economic livelihood while creating connections between old ane new homes, languages, and textiles.

The photographs are accompanied by an in-depth conversation between Garabedian and curator Samuel Saelemakers about the relationship between photography and sculpture, public representation, and diasporic thinking.

Art --- sculpture [visual works] --- outdoor sculpture --- photography [process] --- trade [function] --- globalization --- diaspora --- Garabedian, Mekhitar --- trade [general function]

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Het Koninklijk Museum voor Midden-Afrika werd opgericht in 1898, maar de officiële opening van het huidige gebouw vond pas in 1910 plaats en werd gekenmerkt door vele symbolen die de koloniale propaganda van die tijd weerspiegelen. De grote rotonde, ontworpen als ingang van het museum, herbergt een reeks standbeelden die sprekende voorbeelden zijn van de tijdsgeest en de stereotypen met fundamenteel racistische inslag.

Tussen 2013 en 2018 onderging het KMMA een uitgebreide renovatie waarbij de permanente tentoonstelling grondig werd heringericht, met de hulp van leden van de Afrikaanse diaspora in België. Een belangrijke uitdaging bij deze renovatie was het doel een gebouw te dekoloniseren dat als beschermd monument is geklasseerd en bijgevolg wettelijk niet kan worden verbouwd. Aangezien de oorspronkelijke beelden niet mochten worden verwijderd, was het museum gedwongen dit te doen op een originele manier. Het stelde met name voor aan hedendaagse Afrikaanse kunstenaars om installaties te creëren die een dialoog, een contrast en een discussie aangaan met de koloniale symbolen.

De Congolese kunstenaar Aimé Mpane werd geselecteerd om vanaf 2018 een dergelijk werk te realiseren in de rotonde. Hij creëerde Nieuwe Adem of Ontluikend Congo, maar het AfricaMuseum begreep als snel dat het, om tegemoet te komen aan zijn publiek, een stap verder moest zetten. Samen met de Belgische kunstenaar Jean Pierre Müller stelde Aime Mpané vervolgens, naast de creatie van een tweede sculptuur, het project RE/STORE voor: de permanente installatie van transparante gazen, gespannen voor elke nis van de rotonde, elk met een hedendaagse boodschap. De thema’s, sterk en expliciet, maken indruk op de bezoekers van het museum.

Colonisation. Decolonisation --- Art --- colonization --- Royal Museum for Central Africa [Tervuren] --- Congo --- dekolonisatie --- African diaspora --- Mpané, Aimé --- Müller, Jean Pierre --- Central Africa --- Mpane, Aimé

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Art --- art [discipline] --- racial discrimination --- colonization --- migration [function] --- slavenhandel --- African diaspora --- African American --- Modernist --- anno 1900-1999 --- anno 2000-2009 --- Europe --- Sub-Saharan Africa --- Caribbean area --- America