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Space for Pan African Research Creation and Knowledge

Space for Pan African Research Creation and Knowledge
Sparck logo hd.jpg
General information
Name Space for Pan African Research Creation and Knowledge
Year founded 2008
Website SPARCK
Senior staff
Director Kadiatou Diallo and Dominique Malaquais

Space for Pan African Research Creation and Knowledge (SPARCK) is a multi-sited, multi-disciplinary project founded in 2008 in collaboration with The Africa Centre. It is structured around a series of residencies for artists from across Africa and the African diaspora working in numerous media and styles, a wide range of exhibitions, installations, performances, screenings, Internet link-ups, publications, round-table discussions and workshops. Its initiatives are directed at a diverse body of the public and actively engaged local communities.

SPARCK is a triennial endeavour. Its first three-year initiative (2009–2011) was entitled "Net / Works: Trans-Local Cultures in the Making of African Worlds.” This initiative explores intersections between creativity in multiple fields (visual, performance and new media arts; the spoken and written words; on-the-ground and in-the-virtual-world activism) and emergent urban spaces in the African world. It brings Cape Town and South Africa into a lively exchange with networks of urban artists, activists and scholars from three countries: Nigeria, the Democratic Republic of Congo and Senegal.

Through its multiple projects, SPARCK aims to foster cross-disciplinary and trans-local partnerships and endeavours, to promote dialogue and exchange that transcends the boundaries of age, social class, gender, as well as spatial, professional and ethnic difference.

SPARCK launched its first arts residency in March 2009 with artist, Kakudji. A controversial multi-media artist, Kakudji was invited to construct a two-part project in South Africa.

Part 1 took place in Johannesburg, during the first half March. The project, entitled "Urban Scenographies," brought together over 30 artists from four continents for a period of one month and gave rise to three events: a 3-day festival of performances, exhibitions and installations held in inner-city Johannesburg; a conference/performance at one of France's foremost experimental arts venues, Théâtre Paris-Villette; and a multi-disciplinary installation at Art Basel. An experimental video by Kakudjii about the Scenographies project was featured in all three settings.

Part 2 of Kakudji's residency took place In Cape Town from 16 March to 16 April 2009. Alongside video and still photography documenting his encounter with the "Mother City," Kakudji produced a body of some fifty collages. In these works, Kakudji made use of local currency to frame his perceptions of the city and more broadly of South Africa. Thematically and formally, the work focused on notions of deal-making: how things are made and un-made, done and undone and how economies of violence (monetary, political, social) are developed and implemented through such processes.


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