Art Moves Africa – Retracing Roots and Tracing New Routes: Mobility and Touring in North Africa

14
Introduction
Arab identity was reinforced at the time of decolonization,
with pan-Arabism becoming the
“ideological lingua franca” across the region
and the Middle East (El Amrani, 2011). Part
and parcel of this process was the glossing
over and erasure of the multiplicity of cultural,
linguistic and ethnic identities within the
various nation states, with marginalization
of Amazigh heritage, language and culture as well
as those of Black individuals and communities.
Amazigh resistance movements have obtained
some recognition at state level, with Algeria
redefining itself as an “Arab, Berber, Muslim”
nation and Morocco recognizing Amazigh as an
official language in 2011. North Africans’ “African”
identity has been more complex to unearth and
foreground.
North Africa’s “separateness” is often justified
by the presence of the Sahara desert, largely
on the basis of conceptions of the desert as an
“empty space” by European geographers and
explorers and thus as an invisible border separating
the continent. Artists and intellectuals have
contested this idea, noting its correlation with
colonial and contemporary geopolitical agendas
and reminding us that the Sahara has been
a space of advanced political and social
organization, hospitality, trade and cultural
exchange for centuries. Indeed, trade routes
have traversed its expanse, linking cities
and civilizations to the North and South as
well as those within it.
There is also a push to revive and nurture
the pan-Africanist energies, intellectual
productions and artistic connections that
were developed in the 1950s and 60s. Notably,
Algeria hosted the first Pan-African
festival of 1969. This thrust of pan-Africanist
unity collapsed due to a number of factors,
both internal and external to the continent.
Connections between North and South are
now playing out in the economic sphere,
with Morocco making important overtures
—
QUOTE:
« There is an assumption
that the Maghreb is
something somewhere
else than in Africa and
even that Egypt is an
archaeological island off
the coast of American
universities. »
Koyo Kouoh
Chief curator of Zeitz
Museum of Contemporary
African Art, Cape Town/
former executive director
of RAW Material Company
Dakar
Quote from Opening Remarks
at 1:54 art fair, 2017
—
to other African nations in the areas of foreign
investment and trade; Algeria has been following
suit. How do art and cultural production
participate or not in connecting North and
South today?
—
1. 3. 2 REGIONALIZATION
AND FUNDING
—
Contemporary regionalization has created
further boundaries within and outside North
Africa. On the largest scale, North Africa is
often grouped with the Middle East under
the acronym MENA, or else is subsumed as
a space within the Arab World. These terms
are used in politics, academia, business and
media, by international organizations such
as the World Bank and the United Nations,
as well as by most international development
organizations. Egypt occupies a unique status
within this space, due to its positioning at the
hinge between the African continent and the
Middle East.
Within North Africa, regionalization operates
mainly at two levels: first, at the
level of the Maghreb; and secondly, at
the level of the (Euro-)Mediterranean
space. The Maghreb connects Morocco,
Algeria, Tunisia, Libya and Mauritania.
The unifying factor is mainly cultural, with
the countries sharing Amazigh heritage.
Shared colonial histories and resultant
linguistic commonality also bind Tunisia,
Morocco and Algeria. The Maghreb’s
geopolitical and economic identity was
formalized with the 1989 formation of
the Arab Maghreb Union. However, the
union remains largely inactive due to
enduring tensions between Morocco
and Algeria over Western Sahara.
The regionalization of the Euro-Mediterranean
was formalized in 2008
at the Paris Summit for the Mediterranean.
Its aim is to reinforce the