The Lagos Biennial announces the opening of its 4th edition on 3rd of February 2024 after being postponed from last year. The international exhibition of contemporary art, design and architecture originally scheduled for September 2023, will open to the public at the Tafawa Balewa Square, Onikan and will run till the 10th of February, 2024. Themed REFUGE, Lagos Biennial 2024 addresses the concept of the nation-state and critically reflects on the site of the exhibition, Tafawa Balewa Square, the venue of Nigerian independence celebrations in 1960.
Speaking about the Tafawa Balewa Square, Folakunle Oshun, the founder and the co-artistic director of the Lagos Biennial 2024 says “In addition to its importance in nation-making in the early post-independence phase, and leisure activities in colonial times, hosting concerts during FESTAC ’77 marked a pivotal moment at this key venue because FESTAC’s enduring legacy lies in its visionary pursuit of a global-scale initiative to honor and amplify African cultures across the continent and its diasporas. Also, drawing inspiration from the 6th Pan
African Congress in 1974, held in Dar es Salaam, I wonder, how can we reimagine this rich cultural inheritance in Lagos, fifty years later?” The Lagos Biennial 2024 will feature the works of 80 participants from 30 countries responding to the theme through architectural pavilions, art installations, artist talks, film screenings, projections and performances. This edition includes veteran Nigerian artists Demas Nwoko and Bruce Onabrakpeya.
“It offers an opportunity to reassess the promises, disappointments, and ongoing ramifications of the nation-state model with its panoply of modes of governance under the aegis of global capital” says Kathryn Weir, the co-artistic director of 2024 edition of the Biennial. “The critical issues of this 21st century – even though global in reach – are played out in local, national, and regional spaces.” The Lagos Biennial is sponsored and supported by Royal Air Maroc, Terra Foundation for American Art, Guest Artists Space Foundation, Open Society Foundations, Institut Français Nigeria, Alliance Française Lagos at the Mike Adenuga Centre, Goethe Institut Nigeria, ko artspace, ProHelvetia, Friends of Lagos Biennial, and St. Nicholas Hospital, The Lagos Biennial is Endorsed by the Lagos State Ministry of Tourism, Arts and Culture.
Entrance to the Biennial is free after registering at www.lagos-biennial.org/tickets.
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Created and founded by artists in 2017, the Lagos Biennial is a not-for-profit contemporary art platform under the Àkéte Art Foundation, which is a Lagos-based artist collective registered with the Corporate Affairs Commission in Nigeria. Through its activities, the Biennial privileges adventurous approaches to art-making, presentation, and critical discourse – aspiring to broach complex social and political problems, cultivate new publics, and establish fresh modes of engagement within the city, as well as throughout the country and internationally.
