A continent. A diaspora.
A conversation.
OPENING THE JOURNAL
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Elgin Rust turns photographs of architecture in Ghana, Cairo, Dubai and Cape Town into speculative floating structures in Sky Cities: Futures in Flux. At the AVA Gallery, digital manipulation meets cyanotype printing, bringing environmental uncertainty and material change into view. The exhibition pairs her visual work with an independent sound piece, Umoya.
A profile of Ghanaian artist and educator kąrî’kạchä seid’ou traces the experimental teaching that helped reshape contemporary art in Kumasi. Following his selection for the 2026 Prince Claus Impact Award, the article examines KNUST’s Emancipatory Art Teaching Project, blaxTARLINES and a collaborative philosophy that places shared knowledge and institutional change above individual visibility.
The Institut français de Kinshasa announced an exhibition of Chéri Chérin’s paintings to mark a year since his death. Reporting on October 6, ACP gave dates of October 22–November 21 for the presentation. The selection was intended to revisit the Congolese painter’s observations of society and his contribution to popular painting, rather than introduce a newly produced body of work.
ACP reported on Kakibaruki, a photographic exhibition in Lubumbashi exploring African hairstyles as carriers of identity and memory. Ruth Mpombo connected the project to childhood experiences of school-imposed hairstyles and to the transmission of cultural knowledge. Fellow photographer Chris Mizangi described portraits pairing dreadlocks with knitted plant forms, examining how people inherit, reshape and carry their roots.
Congolese comics artist Barly Baruti told ACP that the Dakar Biennale could help advance BD Safari, a proposed network linking Kinshasa, Dakar and Tétouan. He outlined ambitions to circulate works, share training and build connections between comics markets across the continent. Baruti also discussed bringing questions of memory, resistance and cultural self-determination into his Dakar contribution. The report described plans and aspirations, not an already operational cross-border network.
A collective mural has given Kinshasa’s Le Zoo cultural centre a new façade, placing African women at the centre of its imagery. Director Paul Ngoie Le Perc told ACP that the work grew from the Kinshasa Urban Art Festival’s focus on violence against women, with Kimpa Vita representing resistance. He presented the mural as part of an effort to reopen the centre to artists and creative communities.
Safia Siad’s October C& feature traces how Mallory Lowe Mpoka works with inherited photographs, reused textiles, soil and plants to explore belonging. The Montréal-raised artist’s projects connect family histories in Cameroon with experiences across borders. Siad revisits The Matriarch and Deborah’s Garden, shown in Montréal in 2025, while discussing Mpoka’s evolving practice.
ArtThrob previews a Nairobi exhibition developed through Kairos Futura’s eight-week arts programme with young people around Kenya’s Mau Forest. Through sculpture, printmaking, wearable design and collective storytelling, participants imagine the forest in 2099, exploring ecological recovery and possible relationships between communities and their environment.
The Tobundela Congo collective has presented a portrait and a book of artists’ messages to Kinshasa’s Genocost memorial, ACP reports. Painter Noelline N’Samu describes the portrait as honouring women and survivors in eastern DR Congo. The presentation formed part of Les mémoires des vivants, a performance developed with Fonarev around remembrance, justice and peace.
ACP reports that ELIKIA-Archéologies brings four artists from eastern DR Congo to Kinshasa’s Genocost memorial. The exhibition addresses memory, peace and resilience through visual art. Among the participants, Edith Congane uses painting and collage to explore the body as a site of memory, emphasising vitality and survival rather than reducing communities to suffering.
Six Luanda galleries are presenting new exhibitions during Noite das Artes, Novo Jornal reports. The route links Mayamba, Espaço Luanda Arte, Why Not, Palomino Artes, The Art Affair and D’Maio, with free admission and transport between venues. Organisers hope the last-Friday initiative will become a regular meeting point for artists, galleries and wider audiences.
Novo Jornal reports that young Angolan filmmakers created short films for an exhibition at Luanda’s Palácio de Ferro marking fifty years of diplomatic relations with France. Produced with the French embassy, the films were presented alongside photographic archives, bringing a younger generation’s audiovisual perspectives into dialogue with the history of bilateral cooperation.
Speaking to ACP, Arnold Kufulula describes Shango et Zaïire as a comic built around a father’s message to his son. Its visual storytelling brings together Kongo cosmology, oral traditions and rites of passage. The author positions the work as a means for young Congolese readers to encounter cultural memory and intergenerational responsibility.
Ibrahim Mahama’s Voyageur places three wooden boats upright in Naples’s Piazza Municipio, connecting Ghanaian craftsmanship with the Mediterranean port’s histories of movement. Curated by Vincenzo Trione for Napoli Contemporanea, the public installation considers labour, trade and migration through vessels whose arrested journeys turn familiar objects into carriers of memory and exchange.
Novo Jornal reports that Luanda’s Palácio de Ferro is hosting 200 young creators from Angola’s 21 provinces. The national showcase includes visual and applied arts alongside other disciplines, and will select 15 representatives for the CPLP biennial in Cabo Verde. Organised by the Angolan Youth Institute, it links local practice with international opportunities.
ACP reports on Kadima Muadianvita’s painting inspired by a palm-fibre textile given to him during a visit to the Kuba kingdom. The Congolese artist depicts its maker and carries the textile’s patterns into the background, connecting inherited craftsmanship with contemporary painting and the transmission of cultural memory.
Madar 21 reports that Asilah’s autumn cultural season will include printmaking, oil painting and lithography alongside its wider programme. Exhibitions feature Moroccan artists Mohamed El Mourabiti and Younes Kharraz, photographs by the late Mohamed Benaïssa and children’s work. A tribute symposium will examine art historian Toni Maraini’s relationship with Morocco’s visual arts scene.
APS reports plans for Police culturelle at Dakar’s Museum of Black Civilisations on October 10. Organised by the cultural press association and national police, the event includes an exhibition and live painting alongside music and poetry. Organisers say the programme will give artist-officers public visibility and encourage dialogue with communities.
Madar21 publishes MAP’s account of the fourteenth Morocco Visual Arts Salon in Fès. Organised around the transition from sketchbook to finished work, the programme combines an emerging-artists exhibition and competition with painting, sculpture, ceramics, calligraphy and installation. Guest artist Iryna Grytsenko highlights the productive encounter between preliminary studies and completed works.
APS reports on a touring exhibition of fifteen African and diaspora artists at Dakar’s Théodore Monod museum, continuing until September 20. Paintings, tapestries, photographs and installations address gender, ecology, sovereignty and memory. Curator Michèle Desmottes stresses the artists’ individual positions rather than a single representative image of the continent.