An Ideal Library/Une Bibliothèque Idéal

2012

Contributors: Georges Adéagbo, David Adjaye, Nana Ofioratta Ayim, Zarina Bhimji, Maria Magdalena Campos-Pons, Chris Dercon, Aissa Dionne, Richard Flood, Meschac Gaba, Thelma Golden, Khaeld Hafez, Kan-Si, Moshekwa Langa, Joëlle Lebussy, Ato Malinda, Santu Mafokeng, Patrick Mudekereza, Oumar Ndao, Jimmy Ogonga, Hans-Ulrich Obrist, Elvira Dyangani Ose, Marylin Doualla-Bell & Didier Schaub, Guy Tillim, Anton Vidokle and many more.

Tags: Residencies Workshops Education Artists studios Archives ResearchKnowledge Critique Public Art Writing Biennials and Festivals Multimedia Curatorial Practice Library Talks and Discussions

The practice of art in the African continent has been denoted as a space that has to look outside for reference and validation. And this phenomenon manifests itself in the many movements that have been seasonally defining the practice of art on the continent and the rest of the world.

An Ideal Library publication is a product of Raw Material Company, a project space based in Senegal, with the objective of compiling a list of content which would be part of a resource center “specialized in contemporary art practice with an emphasis on Africa and Africa related ideas and works” (Kouoh, 2012). The editors have invited a vast array of practitioners from curators, artists and writers who suggested each between 3–5 written material from books, or publications to even music and films, which became part of the Ideal Library.

The contributors were invited to put forward texts of all forms that have had a significant impact on their practice, acknowledging the challenges for knowledge dissemination across the continent and affirming a globalized and multidisciplinary context for contemporary art thinking today. The book is not translated meaning some texts are in French and others in English.

Ideas, Comments and Adhesions by selected contributors:

Ato Malinda
Frantz Fanon, 1963, Wretched of the Earth
Jean-Paul Sartre, Black Orpheus
Okot, P’Bitek, 1986, Artist the Ruler Ousman Sembene, 2004, Moolade (film)
Simone De Beauvoire, 1949, The Second Sex

Godfried Donkor
Thomas Edward Bowdich, 1819, The Mission from the Cape Coast Castle to Ashantee

Johannes Phokela, 2009, I Like My Neighbours
Ngugi wa Thiong’o, 1981, Decolonising the Mind
CLR James, 1963, Black Jacobins
Aleksandr Sergeevich Pushkin, 1996, The Complete Prose Tales of Alexandr Sergeevich Pushkin