Issue 214
‘I’m increasingly interested in those possibilities outside and beyond the solely human.’
– John Akomfrah
In the October issue of frieze, the ground-breaking UK filmmaker John Akomfrah is in conversation with The Otolith Group’s Kodwo Eshun and Anjalika Sagar; Akinbode Akinbiyi, Natasha A. Kelly, Mahret Ifeoma Kupka and Susan Neiman draw attention to the history of Afro-Germany; and Willem de Rooij answers our questionnaire. Also, for the first time frieze is offering an exclusive limited edition, Our Skin Is a Monument I (2020), the artwork created by John Akomfrah for cover for this issue. Available to buy here.
‘The main thing is the courage that it takes on our part to embrace the unthought – a courage that is not acknowledged enough.’ At the end of the summer, the filmmakers and friends John Akomfrah and The Otolith Group’s Kodwo Eshun and Anjalika Sagar met over Zoom for a wide-ranging conversation on contemporary cinema and decentring the human.
Roundtable: Black Deutschland
‘The idea that culture only belongs to a particular tribe denies the value and power of culture itself.’ In light of the global push for racial equality and justice, Akinbode Akinbiyi, Natasha A. Kelly, Mahret Ifeoma Kupka and Susan Neiman examine the overlooked history of Afro-Germany and what we can learn from it.
Also featuring:
A thematic essay by Stephen Squibb on the aesthetics of disinformation. A profile by Muna Mire of the filmmaker Tourmaline. 1,500 words by Elvia Wilk on how Nancy Baker Cahill’s augmented-reality works are freeing public monuments from the ideology of control. Maika Pollack responds to Thao Nguyen Phan’s Perpetual Brightness (2019).
Columns: New Rules
Kyle Chayka on Patreon’s new model of art patronage; Liv Fontaine offers ten tips on how to be a performance artist; Evan Moffitt interviews Stefan Benchoam and Jessica Kairé, the co-founders of Guatemala City’s NuMu; Jessica Loudis on the new magazines giving speed to cultural revolution; and Ana Tuazon on the emerging alternative spaces, led by artists of colour, that are leaving a stagnant art world behind.
Plus, a special supplement with selected texts from Frieze Masters: contributing editor Jonathan Griffin on how Gianfranco Gorgoni’s photographs documented the Land Art movement and Charles Saumarez Smith on the changing fashions in exhibition design. Also, 28 reviews from around the world and online, including exhibitions by James Benning, Sonia Boyce, Marlene Dumas, Toyin Ojih Odutola and Tai Shani.
