Research project and study trip around the project Maison Gbégbé in Agouegan, Togo

The public interest in the restitution of objects looted by colonizers during colonization after centuries has returned and established itself in the national and international world at academic, religious, cultural, political, and artistic levels. This debate, close to the hearts of both Europeans and Africans, is and can be seen as a moment that makes it possible to revive a past together and create collective memories of it. In this context, architect and anthropologist Sénamé Koffi Aboudjinou, highpriest Messanh Amedegnato and visual artist Mathilde ter Heijne are developing the community project and Maison Gbégbé in Aného, Agouegan in Togo, together with members of Maison Gbégbé’s pre-configuration committee Ohiniko Toffa, Nadja Ofouatey-Alazard, Rossila Goussanou, and Anani Sanouvi.

Exchanges and Invisible Entanglements and a study trip were organized in collaboration with l’Union des Cultes Traditionnelles du Togo (UCTT), Dekoloniale Berlin, Berlin Open Lab, and the Berlin University of the Arts. During the study trip, members of Maison Gbégbé‘s pre-configuration committee were able to visit Agouegan as well. This project could not have taken place without the support of the KKWV, the Faculty of Fine Arts of the UdK, Art&Dialogue e.V., and the Goethe Institute München.

In Togolese Traditional Knowledge a distinctly collaborative and participatory understanding of art is lived. Is it possible to overcome the separation of traditional culture and contemporary art that is constituted in the Western European exhibition business? In this project, we want to programmatically focus on the interstices and connecting elements of binaries focus.

Workshops, evaluations, and discussions took place with a.o. lecturers Gregor Kasper & Musquiqui Chihying, Omonblanks Omonhin, Nanna Lüth, and Arlette-Louise Nkoze.

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