During the last 5 years close contacts have been developed by the Foundation
Arts iD Sudan between artists and intellectuals from Sudan and The Netherlands.
At a crossroad between Arabic and African cultures, Sudanese artists work within multiple social contexts, which point to a globalized cultural space. Dutch artists and curators working there and the Festival The Other Sudan last year in the Netherlands, have both created here in Holland an atmosphere of great curiosity and interest in cultural developments in Sudan.
The Khartoum Art Lab project aims to establish a platform for critical thinking and contemporary artistic practices: visual arts, performing arts, new media, music etc.
in Khartoum, Sudan, through
the set-up of an independent space for these practices and the organization of a series of international events related to those practices. We think about festivals, workshops, exhibitions, publications, a digital archive and a website…
Activities will take place both in The Netherlands and Sudan.
The project covers three main areas:
1. Educational: workshops, lectures, seminar, master-classes
2. Curatorial: exhibitions, screenings, presentations and artist-in-residencies
3. Research: set up of an archive dedicated to the documentation of contemporary practices and a library
4. Local development: interaction and sharing of skills and competences between international artist and local independent artists and producers.
First step in the development of the project will be a research phase in Khartoum.
Contacts will be made/ renewed with the Sudanese Artists Union, the Sudanese Writers Union, the Goethe Institute, French Cultural Centre, the University of Sudan, Ahfad Women University, National Theatre etc. and independent Sudanese specialist working within the domain of the project.
We will look for possible interactions with local partners, and a localization of a space for production of the first set up of workshops and lectures with international artists and producers which will take place the coming years.
The project will be developed by Mieke Kolk of Arts iD Sudan Foundation, by Pauline Burmann, specialist in Modern African Art and Lucrezia Cippitelli art historian specialized in new media.
Short cv of the proposing team:
Dr Mieke Kolk, Institute for Theatre Studies, UVA, Amsterdam has set up cultural exchange-projects with Egypt an Sudan since 2002, organized 4 intercultural conferences on Arabic/African Art and Theatre and edited its proceedings.
Last publication: Performing Gender in Arabic/African Theatre, Amsterdam/Khartoum 2009 She was director of the Festival: The Other Sudan, last fall in Holland.
Dr Pauline Burmann, advisor and curator, has been collaborating with individual artists and international art institutions. She is CAN ambassador, an initiative, a part of PUMA, a creative african network platform with global reach, connecting the creative world within and outside Africa. In the Netherlands she is Chairperson of the Thami Mnyele foundation, and connected with the Dutch Arica House and co-founder of ZAM magazine, cultural section.
Dr Lucrezia Cippitelli is curator, professor and visiting scholar at the Institute of Comparative Modernities of Cornell University (USA). She works on intermediality and art-practices at the intersection of new technologies and media, with a focus on Latin America and Africa. Collaborating with the Time_FRAMe platform she works in Salvador, Cuba, an independently in Ethiopia and Kenia.
