Poetic Justice

"He studied political science, but still considered himself a poet when he graduated in 1987 from what is now New Jersey City University. Soon after, the fall of the Berlin Wall would herald the end of the Cold War. Until that point, certain African and Caribbean countries, such as Cuba, had relied on the support of their Communist big brother. In the coming years, we witnessed a change that would disrupt the precarious global balance-the aftereffects of which we are still feeling today."

"At the time, a counter-discourse was also emerging that sought to challenge the Atlanticist hegemony over the historicization of art from the non-Western world. Jean-Hubert Martin's controversial 1989 exhibition, " Magiciens de la terre " (Magicians of the Earth) at the Centre Pompidou and the Grande Halle de la Villette set in motion a series of debates that sought to redress monolithic art history in light of emergent discourses of postcolonialism, authenticity, and Africanity."

"Soon after I founded the publication Revue Noire in 1991 with Jean Loup Pivin, Pascal Martin Saint Léon, and Bruno Tilliette in Paris, I found myself at a Düsseldorf conference having a heated argument onstage with the curator Jan Hoet. Hoet asserted that there was no contemporary art in Africa. (That didn't prevent him from inviting three artists he had read about in Revue Noire to his Documenta in 1992.)"

Okwui Enwezor left Nigeria for the United States in 1982 at nineteen, studied political science, and still considered himself a poet when he graduated in 1987 from New Jersey City University. The fall of the Berlin Wall ended the Cold War, cutting some Communist support to African and Caribbean countries and altering global balances. A counter-discourse challenged Atlanticist dominance over the historicization of non-Western art. Jean-Hubert Martin's 1989 Magiciens de la terre and Susan Vogel's 1991 Africa Explores provoked debates about postcolonialism, authenticity, and Africanity. Revue Noire launched in Paris in 1991. Jan Hoet denied contemporary African art yet later included African artists in Documenta 1992.

Read at Artforum