Building Africa: An exhibition about how architecture shapes politics 11 January – 16 March 2024
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Building Africa explores the relationship between architecture and politics. It tells stories about presidential palaces, courts, parliaments, a school, a sports stadium, airports and the African Union building itself and explains how they build political institutions and identities around the continent.
The exhibition is based on findings from a five-year research project at SOAS, which has been interpreted by design-teams from Ethiopia, South Africa and Ghana, each one producing an installation that explores local responses to the buildings. These installations were originally exhibited in Addis Ababa, Johannesburg and Accra. They come together now to show how complex and often fraught political ideas are played out through architecture and popular responses to it.
Dates and opening hours
11 January – 16 March 2024
10.30am-5.00pm, Tuesday-Saturday
Late opening until 8.00pm on Thursdays
Brunei Gallery, Thornhaugh Street, Russell Square, London WC1B 5DQ
ADMISSION IS FREE
Exhibition events
Alongside the exhibition we are running a series of public talks on topics on Politics and Architecture in Africa. They are all in the Brunei Gallery at SOAS.
Events are all free but you need to register for the talks (see links below).
25 Jan Nora Naji ‘Out of Africa: built-in security for outsiders on Lamu Island’, 17.00-19.00, Room B103, Brunei Gallery, SOAS. Read more. Registration
8 Feb Tomà Berlanda ‘The languages of contemporary architecture in Sub-Saharan
Africa: 1960-2020’. 17.00-19.00, Room B103, Brunei Gallery, SOAS. Registration
15 Feb Brook Hailieselassie ‘Aesthetics of prosperity: the megaprojects of Addis Ababa' 17.00-19.00, Room B103,Brunei Gallery, SOAS. Registration
22 Feb Julia Gallagher ‘Building-States: political authority and architecture in Africa’.
17.00-19.00, Room B103, Brunei Gallery, SOAS. Registration
29 Feb Laura Routley 'The architecture of colonial imprisonment: the afterlives of colonial
incarceration in Africa’, 17.00-19.00, Room B103, Brunei Gallery, SOAS. Registration
7 Mar Innocent Batsani-Ncube ‘Not soft, not sharp’: the subtext of China’s subtle power through and in African parliament buildings’, Room B103, 17.00-19.00, Brunei Gallery, SOAS. Registration.
8 Mar Nahom Teklu, Khensani Jurczok-de Klerk, Aude Tollo, Augustine Owusu-Ansah, Lois Quartey, Kuukuwa Manful and Julia Gallagher ‘Academics and architects creating knowledge together: Building Africa’s curators and designers roundtable’. Brunei Gallery, SOAS. Registration
12 Mar Kuukuwa Manful, 'Building the nation and constructing class: the architecture of
education in Ghana’, Registration