From the Editor

FROM THE EDITOR hange is a most difficuLt undertaking, and when it issues not from conviction but from the wells of moraL pressure, change is a very sLow undertaking indeed. Over the past few years the steady emergence of contestatory voices in the arena of internationaL cuLturaL poLitics have begun to extract change from the power circles of that enterprise. We have watched cuLturaL inclusiveness in the west shift ever so gradually from the tokenism of LiberaL gestures to the tokenism of reLuctant, even resentfuL institutionaL compuLsion. In 1990 Kinshasa ConwiLL and Grace StanisLaus of the Studio Museum in HarLem took contemporary African artists other than the Egyptians, into the BiennaLe of Venice for the first time since the expuLsion of South Africa from the biennaLe. In the intervening period African artists have appeared at the Pompidou Centre in France and at the Serpentine and Tate in EngLand. When EL Anatsui first appeared at the Habana BiennaLe a few years ago he was the onLy artist whose details did not appear in the cataLog, and so was Mo Edoga when he became the first African artist at the Documenta. Today Lengthy essays accompany the appearance of African artists at those venues, and even more, an African wiLL speak as one of the 100 invited guests at the tenth Documenta directed by Catherine David in KasseL. At the WhitechapeL in London, the Guggenheim in New York, the Museum of Modern Art in San Francisco, the Setagaya in Japan, African artists are making momentary appearances. With these sporadic institutionaL concessions, we couLd say, perhaps, that the doors of the estabLishment are beginning to open. What we have not seen in truLy convincing form, is a thorough rehauL of the mind in the power centers of gLobaL cuLture, or a genuine desire to move, once and for aLL, out of the inhibitions of traditions of exclusion. Where admittedLy it has become not uncommon for major cuLturaL institutions to insert some African do in their trienniaL programming, as exempLified by the above; some singuLar, comprehensive and often carnivaLesque activity in the form of a week of African arts and cuLture - with drumming, story-telling, an exhibition of contemporary art, and a visit to the city zoo for children - unfortunateLy we are yet to see a worLd where such tacticaL hedging in the name of inclusion becomes unnecessary, a worLd where curators and art institutions find African artists in their vision, freeLy and without compuLsion, without the unspoken reminder of equaL opportunities statutes, aLongside their contemporaries from other parts of the gLobe. Again, ignorance becomes the veritabLe excuse for this faiLure of conviction and vision; the classic pLea that we do not know much about contemporary African artists. They may have their studios in Soho, New York aLongside artists from Japan and IsraeL and PhiladeLphia, PA, or on HetLey Road in London's West End. They may even work with the education and pubLic programs department of the Hayward. It matters LittLe. We simpLy do not know them, and because we do not know them, we often determinedLy ignore them. We bin invitations to their shows even before we've read them, flip over the Listings sections where the occasionaL announcement about them appears, politeLy decline invitations to their studios, and rarely find a place on the gallery stable for them. With aLL the little concessions now common in the art world, for aLL intents and purposes contemporary African artists remain strangers at the door. It is probably the same false plea of ignorance, rather funnily, that might be proffered as an excuse for the continued practice of reaching out to foreign curators and so-called experts when there is a need for African artists. Which is why the director of the recent Sao Paulo Biennale would appoint a French curator for the African pavilion of the biennale even when there are enough competent African curators. The day wiLL yet come when the African may appear on her own, by herself, and not on the guiding arm of a French or American foster figure. For that day to arrive there must a thorough mental stiift in the power centers of global culture so that the...