#3-1: Memory

This section of the exhibition, Marvellous Realism, is concerned with memory—cultural and collective memory, which is to say, how do we, in contemporary culture, think about who or what Africa stands for. Historically, in the popular imagination, Africa has been rendered almost as a site and a place, and as a set of people caught in a perpetual past, as if Africa is always somehow pre-modern, pre-civilizational, and not part of the contemporary world.

Here, memory is not just a way of grappling with these histories but also a means of delving deeper into personal and collective memory. African photographers are thinking historically about African presence, looking back and remembering the past as a route to conjure new visions, new possibilities, and new imaginings, creating endless possibilities for Africa in the present.