Season 1 was recorded between late 2013 and 2014, sometimes on Skype and sometimes in person. We spoke to artists in South Africa, Mozambique, Madagascar and Zimbabwe about the kinds of spaces - physical and ideological - that they create through their artistic work and what it takes to provide this kind of infrastructure (often where there is none to begin with) for entire communities. 

Episode 2: Misheck Masamvu and Georgina Maxim on "Formulating a Movement"

Episode 1: Jethro Louw and Marco Snyders on "Working with the Gap"

Award-winning South African filmmaker Kurt Orderson is usually behind the camera. Turns out he is a natural on front of the camera too. So, we didn’t edit much, making the episode a little longer. But definitely worth it.

Breathe Again and The Prodigal Son are two of what Kurt refers to as his “home movies” – personal stories about his family; but stories too that are shared by the community he is so invested in. Screenings and teaching others how to make films – to become “citizen journalists” – are as important to him as making movies. El Dorado is one example of what can happen when people use the camera as “the new bazooka”.

Episode 5: Kurt Orderson On "Cinema, The Weapon Of Choice"

What does it mean to be a full-time artist in a country that does not legally recognise them (No, seriously, the concept of artist as a profession does not exist)? How do you sustain a film festival amidst ongoing political instability and make people want to fund your project? How does an Island Continent break through the Franco-Anglophone barrier? And most importantly, how to watch film and change mentalities and why you need a cinema for that. You get answers to all of that AND as a special treat and as previously promised, this episode also features a selection of film clips from the RFC archive.

Episode 7: Laza On "A Cinema For Generation RFC"

Ten years ago nobody made movies in Madagascar. Then Malagasy filmmaker and producer Laza returned to Antanarivo and launched Rencontres du Film Court, an annual short film festival and series of workshops that has given rise to a new generation of young Malagasy filmmakers – Génération  RFC. Hundreds of fiction, documentary and animation films from this Indian Ocean island are now traveling the world and are changing the face of African cinema.

In preparation for the 10th anniversary edition of the festival in 2015, Laza reflects on how far Malagasy filmmaking has come since Raymond Rajaonarivelo’s Tabataba won a price at the Cannes Film Festival in 1988. (For those who missed it then, we have included a link to the movie below)

According to Laza, it is particularly in animation that today’s Génération RFC is finding a unique language to tell the many stories of Madagascar. 

Epsiode 6: Laza On "The Cinema Of Generation RFC"

“Artists on Africa” is an experimental podcast series and an attempt to contribute to content generation about Africa, from Africa from a different perspective. It spotlights the ways in which artists and their creative practices located in – or dislocated from – Africa define or redefine the parameters of what might constitute “African” – knowledge, narratives and experiences. It engages the artist as researcher and thinker, inventor, mentor and entrepreneur, as storyteller and translator and perhaps most importantly as expert and inspirer of new ideas.

The podcast takes the form of conversations – recorded via Skype, email or in person; featuring artists working across diverse disciplines –performance to animation, installation to writing, street art to sound, film to architecture and more.  Each episode offers unique insights into the artists’ distinctive work, approaches and ideas and how they relate to knowledge and understanding of Africa as part of a global experience – past, present and future.

This endeavour was initiated by Kadiatou Diallo and has its conceptual roots within the SPARCK programme (Space for Pan-African Research, Creation and Knowledge), which she co-directs with Dominique Malaquais.

www.sparck.org