Colliding Circulations

2023, Exhibition, Doctoral Research

An exhibition on Dakar’s mobilities between global connections and local displacements by Mamadou Diol and Leity Kane from Kaddu Yaraax, curated by Simon Meienberg, supported by Carolin Höfler and Julian Hoffmann.

In Senegal’s capital Dakar, one of the densest and fastest growing cities in West Africa, different mobility systems and understandings collide. Here, the colonial legacy of urban segregation and infrastructural neglect affects the daily circulation of dakarois, Dakar’s inhabitants. At the same time, the Train Express Regional (TER) marks the beginning of a new era of mobility. The train line connects the city to a global transportation network and is hailed by many as a pioneering modernization project. Other voices criticize the increase in the cost of mobility and the social exclusion caused by the imported transport system, which displaces local forms and functions of mobility.

The Colliding Circulations exhibition takes up such unequal mobilities in Dakar. Through diagrammatic recordings and scenic interventions, Senegalese artists explore the effects of colonial continuities on urban spaces and spatial circulation, and the processes of mediation and displacement they trigger. For example, Mamadou Diol and Leity Kane, together with the actors from the Kaddu Yaraax Forum Theater, trace the changes brought about by the construction of the TER line, which on the one hand separates the neighborhoods of Hann-Maristes and Hann-Pêcheur from one another, whilst on the other hand connecting them to a global mobility system, along with the international airport. They deploy their théâtre de l’opprimé (»theater of the oppressed«) as an emancipatory and interactive practice for critical dialog with distressed urban communities and neighborhoods. They translate global dynamics, local lifeworlds, and spatial dissonances of the city into theatrical forms of resistance and resilience. Together, they develop analytical and choreographic tools to describe the production of space under conditions of new interdependencies through large-scale infrastructure systems.

Info

Exhibition: 16 June – 1 July 2023
Opening: Thu, 15 June 2023, 7 p.m.
Opening times:
AIC ON Festival: 16 & 18 June 2023, 12 – 6 p.m.; 17 June 2023, 12 – 4 p.m.
19 June – 1 July 2023:
Thu-Fri, 4 – 7 p.m. & Sat, 2 – 6 p.m. or upon request: glasmoog@khm.de
Venue: GLASMOOG – Space for Contemporary Art & its Discourse, Academy of Media Arts Cologne (KHM), Filzengraben 2, 50676 Köln

Part of the exhibition are the Kaddux Yaraax workshop between May 15 and 19, 2023 and a public talk with Mamadou Diol and Leity Kane on May 17, 2023, 7 p.m. at the Köln International School of Design of TH Köln.

Ausstellungsflyer Deutsch & Englisch
Raumplan Deutsch & Englisch