Foam X African Artists' Foundation
19 May - 27 Aug 2017
Kabangu, 2016 © Osborne Macharia
Kipipiri 4, 2016 © Osborne Macharia
Macicio, 2015 © Osborne Macharia
Text A, from the series L’Ouverture I, 2015 © Kadara Enyeasi
Wo èyìn wò (Watch Your Back), from the series Scenario I: After L’Ouverture, 2016 © Kadara Enyeasi
FOAM X AFRICAN ARTISTS' FOUNDATION
19 May - 27 August 2017
Foam welcomes the African Artists’ Foundation for a collaborative presentation of young African talent at Foam 3h.
The African Artists’ Foundation (AAF) is a non-profit organisation based in Nigeria, dedicated to the promotion and development of contemporary African art. Together, Foam and the AAF present the work of three young photographers from Kenya and Nigeria: Mũchiri Njenga (1985), Osborne Macharia (1986) and Kadara Enyeasi (1994). Their works present fantastical worlds in which past, present, future, fact and fiction converge. Their stylized versions of reality render ambiguous what it is we are looking at: utopia, dystopia or real life?
PARTICIPATING ARTISTS
Foam will be screening Kichwateli (2011) (Swahili for TV-head), a short film by Mũchiri Njenga set in a post-apocalyptic African slum. A young boy with a television for a head wanders the streets of an anonymous city, simultaneously broadcasting and recording information as he goes. The film comments on an inter-generational exchange of cultural traditions and a transhumanist belief in (bio)technological advancement and robotics.
Osborne Macharia creates monumental portraits of members from invented Kenyan tribes. Through highly stylised Afro-futuristic imagery, Macharia reformulates real events in the history of Kenya, such as British colonial rule and the Mau Mau rebellion.
Originally trained as an architect, Kadara Enyeasi is interested in the relation between space and (human) form. His collages constitute a playful variation on the principles of Western Modernists such as Le Corbusier, while also referencing the graphics of African textile design.
COLLABORATE! A YEAR OF VISUAL ENCOUNTERS
Foam X AAF is the second of three collaborations taking place in Foam 3h during 2017, involving photography platforms in Mexico City (Mexico), Lagos (Nigeria) and Yogyakarta (Indonesia) that each operate in a specific local art scene. The initiative offers Foam the opportunity to present young talent from different cultural contexts and to research new developments in local photography discourses worldwide.
This exhibition is made possible with support from the Gieskes-Strijbis Fund, the Van Bijlevelt Foundation and Kleurgamma.
The Collaborate! programme is made possible with the support of Fonds21, the Mondriaan Fund, the Prins Bernhard Cultuurfonds and VSBfonds.
Foam is supported by the BankGiro Loterij, De Brauw Blackstone Westbroek, Delta Lloyd, City of Amsterdam, Olympus and the VandenEnde Foundation.
19 May - 27 August 2017
Foam welcomes the African Artists’ Foundation for a collaborative presentation of young African talent at Foam 3h.
The African Artists’ Foundation (AAF) is a non-profit organisation based in Nigeria, dedicated to the promotion and development of contemporary African art. Together, Foam and the AAF present the work of three young photographers from Kenya and Nigeria: Mũchiri Njenga (1985), Osborne Macharia (1986) and Kadara Enyeasi (1994). Their works present fantastical worlds in which past, present, future, fact and fiction converge. Their stylized versions of reality render ambiguous what it is we are looking at: utopia, dystopia or real life?
PARTICIPATING ARTISTS
Foam will be screening Kichwateli (2011) (Swahili for TV-head), a short film by Mũchiri Njenga set in a post-apocalyptic African slum. A young boy with a television for a head wanders the streets of an anonymous city, simultaneously broadcasting and recording information as he goes. The film comments on an inter-generational exchange of cultural traditions and a transhumanist belief in (bio)technological advancement and robotics.
Osborne Macharia creates monumental portraits of members from invented Kenyan tribes. Through highly stylised Afro-futuristic imagery, Macharia reformulates real events in the history of Kenya, such as British colonial rule and the Mau Mau rebellion.
Originally trained as an architect, Kadara Enyeasi is interested in the relation between space and (human) form. His collages constitute a playful variation on the principles of Western Modernists such as Le Corbusier, while also referencing the graphics of African textile design.
COLLABORATE! A YEAR OF VISUAL ENCOUNTERS
Foam X AAF is the second of three collaborations taking place in Foam 3h during 2017, involving photography platforms in Mexico City (Mexico), Lagos (Nigeria) and Yogyakarta (Indonesia) that each operate in a specific local art scene. The initiative offers Foam the opportunity to present young talent from different cultural contexts and to research new developments in local photography discourses worldwide.
This exhibition is made possible with support from the Gieskes-Strijbis Fund, the Van Bijlevelt Foundation and Kleurgamma.
The Collaborate! programme is made possible with the support of Fonds21, the Mondriaan Fund, the Prins Bernhard Cultuurfonds and VSBfonds.
Foam is supported by the BankGiro Loterij, De Brauw Blackstone Westbroek, Delta Lloyd, City of Amsterdam, Olympus and the VandenEnde Foundation.