Afrofuturism takes flight at &hiFago museum

US - While Black Panther has carved its place in history books as the first major superhero blockbuster with a black director and almost entirely black cast, it’s also notable for bringing afrofuturism to the mainstream. The film’s African sci-fi aesthetic has taken cues from a movement which has been gaining momentum since Sun Ra took the jazz stage in the 1950s.

It’s a discipline that includes literature, music, fashion and art, and in a new exhibition called In Their Own Form, opening at the Museum of Contemporary Photography in Chicago on 12 April, the work of 13 black artists is being celebrated. They used key afrofuturist themes of time travel, technology and heroism long before Marvel’s adventure hit the silver screen. The goal of the show, says curator Sheridan Tucker, is to show a wide range of the Afro-diasporic experience through photography and video. “I wanted to show escapism, nostalgia and time travel, recurring themes in afrofuturism,” said Tucker. “I’m excited people can tap into what I’ve been talking about for a long time.” The exhibition includes works by Senegal artist Alun Be, whose aim is to change people’s perceptions of Africa. Taken from his Edification series, he has photographed children draped in heroic capes while wearing VR goggles. It suggests some parts of Africa could be as hitech as the futuristic world of Wakanda, but few have taken notice. “Are African children the future of Africa, a place others might not think as a forerunner of advanced society?” asks Tucker. “That’s part of common misconception and Alun Be is working to change those ideas.”

How did afrofuturism start? It’s unsure, but , the prolific jazz musician who took to the stage in futuristic regalia in the 1950s, popularized the movement long before it became widespread. Even though the term afrofuturism wasn’t coined until the 1990s, the movement digs back to 20th-century writings of WEB Du Bois and Charles W Chesnutt, and surfaced in pop culture with jazz musician George Clinton, painter Jean-Michel Basquiat and the music of Erykah Badu, Missy Elliott and Janelle Monáe. “It was speculative futurism before we had a name for it in literature and film,” said Tucker. “Since afrofuturism includes literature, poetry, art and mysticism, you can find different starting points.”

(The Guardian)