 | |
| Editor | Jean Loup Pivin and Simon Njami |
|---|---|
| Categories | Art |
| Frequency | Quarterly |
| First issue | 1991 |
| Final issue | 2001 |
| Company | Editions Revue Noire |
| Country | France |
| Based in | Paris |
| Language | English French |
| Website | revuenoire.com/ |
| ISSN | 1157-4127 |
Revue Noire was a quarterly printed magazine dedicated to African contemporary art, published from 1991 to 2001 by Editions Revue Noire.
Revue Noire was founded in 1991 by Jean Loup Pivin, Pascal Martin Saint Lóon, Bruno Tilliette, and Simon Njami. [1] Their goal was to give high-quality printed attention to contemporary African art. It covered varying subjects from sculpture, painting, photography, dance, theatre, music and literature. [2] There were issues on African cities, AIDS, and even gastronomy. Design played a key role in forwarding its objectives and Revue Noire has been described as "glossy, fashion savvy and distinctly Parisian". [3] Images were combined with largely informative texts that highlighted artistic responses to the international media and the touristic gaze as well as the production of discourses of cultural identity on the continent, the framing the African body, urban sites and rapidly changing dynamics between African aesthetic values and Western influences.
From the beginning Revue Noire was aimed at the widest possible audience of those with an interest in art, Africa, or intercultural subject matter. Distributed internationally, it was bilingual (English/French), sometimes adding texts in Portuguese. This language policy and its focus on specific regions - from Abidjan to London, Kinshasa to Paris, Accra, Teshie or Johannesburg to New York or Tokyo - not only facilitated access to information on African artistic production but also forged new links between artist based on the continent and those working in the diaspora.
After 34 issues, Editions Revue Noire interrupted the printing of the journal in 2001 and refocused its attention on publishing books, curating exhibitions and posting occasional online content.
The magazine focuses on artists' monographs and on specific countries or geographic areas where the editorial team produces research on arts (which include visual art, photography, music, literature, dance, theatre, fashion but also architecture and food). Some issues are focuses on a specific field.
Dyula is a language of the Mande language family spoken in Burkina Faso, Ivory Coast and Mali. It is one of the Manding languages and is most closely related to Bambara, being mutually intelligible with Bambara as well as Malinke. It is a trade language in West Africa and is spoken by millions of people, either as a first or second language. Similar to the other Mande languages, it uses tones. It may be written in the Latin, Arabic or N'Ko scripts.
African French is the generic name of the varieties of the French language spoken by an estimated 141 million people in Africa in 2018, spread across 34 countries and territories. This includes those who speak French as a first or second language in these 34 African countries and territories, but it does not include French speakers living in other African countries. Africa is thus the continent with the most French speakers in the world. French arrived in Africa as a colonial language; these African French speakers are now a large part of the Francophonie.
Amadou Hampâté Bâ was a Malian writer, historian and ethnologist. He was an influential figure in twentieth-century African literature and cultural heritage. He was a champion of Africa's oral tradition and traditional knowledge and is remembered for the saying: "whenever an old man dies, it is as though a library were burning down."
Seydou Nourou Doumbia, known as Chris Seydou, was a Malian fashion designer known for his use of traditional Malian fabrics, particularly bògòlanfini (mudcloth).
Joseph Ki-Zerbo was a Burkinabé historian, politician and writer. He is recognized as one of Africa's foremost thinkers.
Chimurenga is a publication of arts, culture and politics from and about Africa and its diasporas, founded and edited by Ntone Edjabe. Both the magazine's name and the content capture the connection between African cultures and politics on the continent and beyond.
Frédéric Fernand Guirma is a diplomat, writer and politician from Burkina Faso. In 1959 he became the president of the trade union centre CATC. From 1960 to 1963 he was the Republic of Upper Volta's first Ambassador to the United States. He was also Permanent Representative to the United Nations. He heads the conservative political party Front de Refus or RDA. He gained 5.87% of the vote in the 1998 presidential election.
AURA is a collective of 17 hip hop artists coming from ten different countries in West Africa and who are committed to use their voices and music for Africa’s development. With the support of the Non Governmental Organization PLAN International, they are engaged in a public awareness campaign relating to Children’s rights and youth problems. With respect, they realized in 2006 the first ever hip hop musical comedy show “The extraordinary Stories of Poto-Poto Children”.
Simon Njami is a writer and an independent curator, lecturer, art critic and essayist.
Ecrans d'Afrique: Revue Internationale de Cinema Television et Video, founded by African filmmakers in Burkina Faso in 1992 during a period of intense worldwide interest and commentary on African T.V. and film, explored all aspects of African film production. It, along with its many contemporaries, sought to ameliorate an intellectual climate which suffered from a dearth of commentary on African film. A corollary of the journal's efforts was to improve worldwide exposure and access to African films - it was linked to the Panafrican Film and Television Festival of Ouagadougou (FESPACO), the continent's leading film festival, from its inception. Ecrans d'Afrique has also been lauded for its wide gaze covering the whole of the African diaspora and for its excellent coverage of Caribbean film developments.
Unir Cinéma: Revue du Cinéma Africain was the first periodical entirely devoted to African cinema to come out of Francophone Africa. Its impact established it as an essential reference tool on cinema on the continent.
Contemporary African art is commonly understood to be art made by artists in Africa and the African diaspora in the post-independence era. However, there are about as many understandings of contemporary African art as there are curators, scholars and artists working in that field. All three terms of this "wide-reaching non-category [sic]" are problematic in themselves: What exactly is "contemporary", what makes art "African", and when are we talking about art and not any other kind of creative expression?
Yacouba Konaté is a curator, writer, art critic and professor of philosophy at the Université de Cocody in Abidjan, Côte d'Ivoire.
The Confédération africaine des travailleurs croyants was a trade union confederation in French West Africa and Togo. C.A.T.C-A.O.F-Togo was founded in Ouagadougou July 8–15, 1956 by the West African branches of the French trade union centre C.F.T.C. David Soumah became the first president of C.A.T.C-A.O.F-Togo.
Michèle Magema, born in Kinshasa in 1977, is a Congolese-French video, performance, and photography artist. She was born in Kinshasa, Democratic Republic of Congo in 1977. She emigrated to Paris, France in 1984, and currently resides in Nevers.
Joseph-Francis Sumégné was born on 30 July 1951 in Bamenjou, Cameroon. Painter and sculptor since 1976, he is a self-taught artist. He lives and works in Yaoundé (Cameroon).
Pierre Haffner (1943-2000) was a French film critic, "one of the first French critics to seriously study African film".
The Abidjan-Niger Railway is a 1,260-kilometre (780-mile) single-track metre gauge line in francophone West Africa that links Abidjan, the economic capital of Ivory Coast to Ouagadougou, the capital of Burkina Faso. The railway, like others on the continent, was constructed by the colonial power to encourage economic development in the region, although detractors would claim that it was to exploit the region solely for their own advantage.
Jean-Dominique Burton, born on 13 October 1952 in Huy (Belgium), is a Belgian photographer and filmmaker, author of several books of photographs focusing on Europe, Asia and Africa. Since 1978, numerous exhibitions have been dedicated to his work, in Europe, Africa, North America and Asia. Many of his works have also been included in public and private collections.
This article uses text from the Chimurenga Library under the GFDL
