How Ghanaian artists are reimagining the country’s past and future at the Venice Biennale

In 1957, King of Highlife music E.T. Mensah opened his now-iconic anthem with the line: “Ghana, we now have freedom,” celebrating the country’s independence at a time when Africa revelled in new-found freedom following centuries-long colonial rule. Between 1956 and 1958, alongside Sudan, Morocco, Tunisia, and Guinea, Ghana was among the first trailblazers of new freedom movements and one of the first fully independent African countries, preceding widespread independence between the 1960s and 1990s.

Now six decades later, the Venice Biennale hosts the first Ghanaian Pavilion under the title Ghana Freedom (named after E.T. Mensah’s song), inviting a group of six, intergenerational Ghanaian and diaspora artists to reflect on the country’s past while speculating on a future which moves beyond the postcolonial. In recent years, Ghana has emerged as a stable West African country due to democratic rule since 1992, following 25 years of military dictatorship. Since then, the country of 30 million has sustained a reputation as a comparatively liberal state for the region, which allows a relative freedom of press and economic prosperity.

Curated by Nana Oforiatta Ayim, the formidable Accra-based, Ghanaian curator, writer and filmmaker, Ghana Freedom speaks to that moment of independence while also reflecting on the meaning of freedom from colonial rule. “It has been sixty-two years now since independence, and how has this freedom expressed itself?” asks Oforiatta Ayim. “In bringing these individuals together, a plurality of form helps to question this collective idea of Ghana, its meaning and usefulness today,” she comments.

Oforiatta Ayim has also tapped renowned architect David Adjaye to design the exhibition which will feature, as the press release states, “elliptically-shaped interconnect spaces plastered with locally-sourced earth” drawing from vernacular Ghanaian architecture. For his part, Adjaye sees the role of an architect as one that moves beyond national identity to solve issues that are not easily understood in the binary sense. He states: “In my work, I’ve always been very interested in the way in which one has to look at the accomplishments of past generations, learn from it, but move forward.” He adds, “this idea of always looking back and understanding human settlements, human patterns, geography, place, light; and then understanding the nuances of the present, the production, the relationship and using them as clues to fabricate fictions about possible futures…This exploration allows us to transcend the idea of one type of living, one type of architecture.”

All of the artists exhibiting will probe collective ideas of what Ghanaian identities mean today, envisioning new spaces of freedom and new forms of politics at a time when notions of borders, nationality and identity are at a point of rupture. Large-scale installations reflecting on migration, economy and materiality will be explored by Nigeria-based sculptor El Anatsui and Ghana-based artist Ibrahim Mahama, both of whom are renowned for their critical material-oriented practice. The complexities of representation and portraiture are tackled by photographer Felicia Abban and London-based painter Lynette Yiadom-Boakye; while filmic representational narratives are explored in a three-channel film projection by British-Ghanaian filmmaker John Akomfrah and video sculpture by Winneba-based artist Selasi Awusi Sosu.

Awusi Sosu explains, “my work in this exhibition celebrates the resilience of everyday Ghanaians as they march on in good times and bad times and eke out a living and enjoy their lives. It also seeks to join others to unveil the uniqueness of glass and, to throw some light on the social, political and environmental issues of factories that are seemingly abandoned.” She continues, “it is a shout out for attention to be paid to important issues that affect national development and, the quality of everyday life…through the lens of the camera and an apparently derelict glass factory, I suggest that beneath the ‘veil of normalcy,’ there are systemic issues that need attention,” she says. Long live Ghana! Long live art!”

In parallel to the Biennale, satellite exhibitions, events and rigorous public programmes will travel across Ghana as an iteration of Mobile Museums, a project first initiated by ANO Institute of Arts & Knowledge, the Accra non-profit founded by Oforiatta Ayim in 2002 to uncover new cultural narratives for the African continent via a roaming museum model that is context responsive and accessible to diverse communities. The pavilion itself will then travel to Accra after Venice.

Ghana Freedom no doubt celebrates the developments of artists both at home and abroad presented at the most important international platform of art today. The pavilion seeks to critically reflect on post-independence movements that have shaped the country’s developments over 62 years. In looking boldly to the future, rather than framing these developments as an arrival of sorts, the pavilion demonstrates that Ghanaian artists long deserve a seat at the international arttable, right here and right now.

Ghana Freedom at the 58th Venice Biennale Arte will take place at the Arsenale, Venice, between 11 May and 24 November, 2019