The Progress of Love

" Where contemporary African art is concerned, curatorial endeavours over the past two decades have focused extensively on interrogating recent political developments, primarily within the contexts of subjectivity and identity formation, citizenship, environmentalism and urbanism. These issues have been approached predominantly in the context of post-independence euphoria and its disillusionment, particularly in African countries that have experienced civil strife, voluntary and forced migration and even societal disintegration. While exhibition projects exploring these concerns do well in critically broaching many of the topical concerns and contemporary realities in various regions, they have also tended to result in skewed narratives that frequently, though inadvertently, result in “Afro-pessimism” or situations wherein the continent is positioned as an emblem of perennial crisis. What then might a critical engagement with the subject of love offer us as an intervention?

The presentation of The Progress of Love at Centre for Contemporary Art, Lagos will explore the question or problem of love through a series of unfolding events and of works in a range of media, highlighting performative artistic practice that has yet to receive adequate presentation or critical engagement within the field of contemporary art in Nigeria or, more broadly, in West Africa. The performance work of Jelili Atiku (Nigeria) and Wura-Natasha Ogunji (USA) will explore the subject of love within the contexts of familial bonds and personal memory, while performative installation works by Temitayo Ogunbiyi (Nigeria) and Valérie Oka (Ivory Coast) coerce viewers into interactive projects that take the technical and ephemeral dimensions of romantic emotions as subjects of inquiry. The moving image forms an integral aspect of the exhibition through the works of Zanele Muholi (South Africa) and Andrew Esiebo (Nigeria), with their insightful and topical documentary projects as well as Adaora Nwandu’s (Nigeria) short films which foreground lived experiences and fictional stories from the perspective of same-gender love confronting a continent that considers such affections taboo. Inspired by personal experiences, family ties, tradition, technology, and local literature, these works express joy, loss, absence, pain and difference; they invoke memory, challenge prejudice and articulate togetherness in lyrical and at times satirical ways.

The Progress of Love at CCA, Lagos opens up a dialogue through presentations that challenge the audience to expand their positions, rethink their preconceptions and prejudices and engage in the multiple ways in which love affects their life.  The growing visibility of the role of the performative in contemporary art is in itself akin to a political act.  With a younger generation of local artists breaking free from the historical dependence on painting and sculpture, live art provides new possibilities and flexibility for transgressing media boundaries and opening up a space for articulating complex ideas about their experiences and daily realities—a space where art converges with life and impacting the way we critically engage and actively explore love today. " excerpt from e-flux announcement