Join artists Sunara Begum and Tunde Jegede and CCA, Lagos Director and curator Bisi Silva for an unparalleled cultural moment.
Sunara Begum
“Art for me is the thread with which we sew together our collective memories. In all my work I try to tell the story of our forever evolving identities. How we came from the rooSunara Begumt and branched out is always different….Our connection is how we go back.”
is a visual artist and filmmaker whose work is perfectly placed between East and West. She uses installation, film, photography and text, and has already created her own distinct visual language and aesthetic which is imprinted in all her work. As a visual artist she has exhibited extensively in galleries across UK and internationally in Europe, Asia and Africa. She began her studies at Camberwell College of Arts and then went on to do her bachelors and masters of fine arts at Central St Martins College of Art & Design.
She has taken part in exhibitions in the UK and internationally including solo exhibitions at the The Crypt Gallery UK, (2014), The Bargehouse (UK, 2013), Drik Gallery (Bangladesh, 2011), 198 Gallery (UK, 2010), and group shows at October Gallery (UK, 2012), Laphto Art Gallery (Ethiopia, 2010), London Art Fair (UK, 2010), Garden Gallery (Pakistan, 2009), LUDA Gallery (Russia, 2009) and Nolias Gallery (UK, 2008).
As a photographer her work has been published in France, UK, China, India and Bangladesh, in magazines and newspapers including Le Monde, and L’Parisian. In 2011 she published her first book, The Legend of Ara, a poetic photographic narrative of a mythical character. Her approach to photography contextualises people, places and environments.
After working as a producer and director of photography on several films including, The Idea and the award-winning feature film, 500 Years Later, she directed her own debut short film, Ara’s Sojourn to critical acclaim. This has been followed by several short films, Ara’s World (2009), The Water’s Will (2010), The Pilgrim Within (2013) and a new documentary series, Truth & Art (2013), featuring three international artists from three continents.
Sunara Begum has continued to develop her own visual narrative-led language on many large-scale projects for productions including, Ancient Futures, which has toured internationally, African Messiah at the Royal Opera House, London, Visions of a Traveller at Lyon Opera House, The Griot’s Tale at Yinka Shonibare’s Studios and Nitin Sawney’s OneZero Project at the Roundhouse in London.
Tunde Jegede
World-renowned composer, producer, cellist and kora virtuoso Tunde Jegede brings a new vision to contemporary African and Western classical music. A renaissance man of the harp-lute with over twenty years experience, his work is a unique synthesis of classical, jazz and traditional music and embodies the legacy of the idiom; African Classical Music.
Tunde’s work has changed the face of classical and contemporary music in Europe and Africa. He is one of the only composers in the world to be steeped in both Western and African Music combining two cultural musical legacies. Tunde Jegede studied both Western classical music and the Griot Tradition of West Africa from a very early age, attending the Purcell School of Music in London and learning from a Master of the Kora in the Gambia, Amadu Bansang Jobarteh.
This unique cultural inheritance has since informed his work as a composer and multi-instrumentalist, creating links between European classical music and that of Africa. With his new solo albums, Heritage and Testimony he has created a set of mirrors between the old and new world, between compositions for solo cello and kora. Tunde Jegede is, in himself, a dialogue between contemporary classical music and a renewed vision of an oral tradition rooted in Malian culture – the Griot vision. He is truly a 21st century renaissance man.
He is currently artistic director of Muson.
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