Building Africa Exhibition at SOAS 

The Building Africa Exhibition curated by Julia Gallagher and Kuukuwa Manful is currently showing at the Brunei Gallery SOAS until 16 March 2024. This is a smaller version of the exhibition which was first shown in Ethiopia as part of the State Architecture Research project at SOAS with Prof Gallagher as its director.

The SOAS exhibition is full of colour featuring, film, photography, a large-scale physical model-installation, publications and school uniforms and memorabilia.  Located in the main gallery space, sections deal with the school history of Ghana, ‘state-built architecture in several African countries, highlighted in the exhibition by images of Ghana’s alternating seats of power, (Osu Castle and State House), and the African Unity building constructed in Addis Ababa. A conceptual installation structure evoking African unity has also been produced by the work of a young Ethiopian architect , Nahom Teklu whose umbrella structure enables exhibition visitors view in VR the ‘state’ architecture of different parts of Africa, it also harks back to the idea of pan-African unity where the umbrella unites all states on the continent.

The exhibition’s thesis that buildings shape us, is made clear to viewer and particularly how the state’s involvement is central to this process of power, positioning, and identity,  particularly in Africa, from its colonial past to the now post-colonial  contemporary situated-ness in Africa’s modern cities to secondary schools in Ghana in which the schools shaped would be future leaders. This was both by the design of the schools within a colonial frame but also school uniforms, motos and other paraphernalia of educational engagement.

State built institutions such as seats of government (state house in the case of Ghana) or stadia (exemplified in the exhibition by the main stadium in Kinshasa) have a more mixed relationship where they both are sites of power, and international events (the Muhammed Ali – Frazier rumble in the jungle, Kinshasa stadium film footage is on show)  or symbols of African Unity  (shown through AU building in Addis Abeba, which often results in tensions of perceptions and strategic plans for future use as regimes and state actors change.

The exhibition also connects the viewer to the research which has underpinned it. This includes the 2023 book Building African Futures edited by Gallagher and Emmanuel Ofori-Sarpong, and Manful; and Manful’s thesis – and a number of papers members of the State Architecture project have published as reports and in peer reviewed journals.

Building Africa packs a dense amount of African state-built architectural history into a a viewable gallery which audiences are invited to view, engage with and critique, helpful post-it notes are provided for this process. The curators explain that this is an adjusted version of the larger 7 panel exhibition and of the conceptual architectural installation has had to be cut short to fit the gallery space. This does not detract from this well-planned and already publicly pleasing and well- received  exhibition.