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Sustaining The Otherwise

@sustainingtheotherwise

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A research and artistic project about restitution, reparation and transformation.
Initiated by Amal Alhaag & Selene Wendt

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Sustaining the Otherwise presents Unsettling All Things Endlessly, a collaboration featuring a residency at Angels&Muse for artist Andrea Chung, an interdisciplinary public program at CCA Lagos, and an artist talk and presentation for the Black Muse Art Festival, Benin City.

The collaborative program Unsettling All Things Endlessly centers around an exploration of the concept of rematriation, and everything that entails, including epistemic restitution and the importance of indigenous and ancestral knowledge, and the potential for spiritual and cultural repair through memory work. The program is guided by an unruly, disruptive, and disorderly approach to dismantling coloniality and the restitution industrial complex.

Within this conceptual context, the program features artists whose work conveys the beautiful otherwise and offers a viable alternative to the patriarchal mindset that still seems to dominate conversations around restitution.

🄿🅁🄾🄶🅁🄰🄼
The program includes a short film screening and an artist talk with Andrea Chung, artist in residence at Angels & Muse, in conversation with Roli O’tsemaye Afinotan, Curator and Artistic Director of Angels & Muse. It also features two live performances: Frail Body by Samuel Udoh and Flo by Oluwatosin Oyee.

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Sustaining the Otherwise is a collaborative research and artistic project about restitution, reparation and transformation, conceived and initiated by curators Amal Alhaag and Selene Wendt in 2023. The program and artist in residency Unsettling All Things Endlessly is developed in collaboration with @AngelsandMuse and hosted by @CCALagos and Angels & Muse in Lagos, Nigeria. by @sustainingtheotherwise

A heartfelt thank you to everyone who joined us for the opening of 'Resounding Rhizomes' — to the artists, curator, collaborators, friends and audiences who came together to mark the beginning of this exhibition.

Curated by Aude Christel Mgba as part of 'Practicing Otherwise', 'Resounding Rhizomes' traces the movement of seeds and plants across borders, and the ways they shape our relationships to land, food, labour, knowledge and one another.

On view at NCAI until 10 January 2027. Entry is free.

Come spend some time with the works.

#ResoundingRhizomes #NCAI #PracticingOtherwise #SustainingTheOtherwise #ContemporaryArt EastAfricanArt by @sustainingtheotherwise

Resounding Rhizomes, curated by Aude Christel Mgba (@audechristel) , looks at how seeds and plants move through the world. Traveling across oceans and borders, they take root in new soils, enter new diets and economies, and settle into new rituals and languages. In this process, they participate in transforming the places and the people they reach and are in turn transformed.

Resounding Rhizomes brings together works by Leo Asemota, Rehema Chachage, Jim Chuchu, Letaru Dralega, Fabiana Ex-Souza, Em’kal Eyongakpa, Linda Lamignan, and Maggie Otieno and is developed in partnership with Sustaining the Otherwise as part of the multilocational program Practicing Otherwise.

📅 Opens: 25 September 2026
🗓 On view until: 10 January 2027
📍 Nairobi Contemporary Art Institute

Resounding Rhizomes is curated by Aude Christel Mgba, and developed and organized in collaboration with Sustaining the Otherwise and NCAI. Sustaining the Otherwise is a collaborative research and artistic project about restitution, reparation and transformation, taking place in multiple locations over several years. by @sustainingtheotherwise

Interdisciplinary artist Nyugen E. Smith’s six-week residency at the Lusaka Contemporary Art Center (LuCAC) became an exploration of what a place can hold—memory, material, histories and traces of those who have passed through it. Developed within Sustaining the Otherwise, a transnational programme rethinking restitution beyond the physical return of objects, Smith’s Stranger Faces (After Serpell) emerged through an experimental process using soil, charcoal and other materials from a fire pit on the grounds of LuCAC. What initially appeared as abstract landscapes slowly revealed faces through prolonged looking.

In conversation with Africans Column, Smith reflects on portraiture, his engagement with the writing of Namwali Serpell, Africa as a site of knowledge production, and his idea of “constant return” as an African descendant. At the centre of the conversation is a compelling proposition: sometimes what is in front of us only becomes visible when we give it time. “Don’t believe the face,” Smith says. “As much as the face reveals, it also hides.” For him, that act of looking again extends to how we understand people, place, memory—and restitution itself.

That process is now travelling beyond Zambia. Through Stranger Faces (After Serpell), Maine Edition, Smith is applying the experimental method developed in Lusaka to overlooked Black and Indigenous maritime histories in Maine, while his wider practice continues across exhibitions, historical projects and public art. What began in a fire pit in Lusaka is becoming a way of asking what landscapes remember—and what might emerge when we learn to look again.
Click the link in bio to read the full interview with Nyugen E. Smith on Africans Column. by @sustainingtheotherwise

Resounding Rhizomes, curated by Aude Christel Mgba opens this Friday, 25 September, at 5pm. Bringing together works by Leo Asemota, Rehema Chachage, Jim Chuchu, Letaru Dralega, Fabiana Ex-Souza, Em'kal Eyongakpa, Linda Lamignan and Maggie Otieno, the exhibition explores the lives and afterlives of plants, and their movements across geography, time, and story.

This will be followed by the Rhizomes of Memory Symposium on Saturday 26th September. Through performances, conversations and a lecture, the symposium brings together diverse perspectives on planting as a practice of sustenance, survival, knowledge-making and cultural transmission.

Resounding Rhizomes is developed in partnership with Sustaining the Otherwise, a collaborative, multi-local artistic project which explores questions of restitution, reparation and transformation.

📍 NCAI
📅 Exhibition opening: Friday, 25 September | 5 PM
📅 Symposium: Saturday, 26 September | 2 PM
Resounding Rhizomes runs until 10 January 2027.

🔗 Sign up for all or either of the events via the links in bio. by @sustainingtheotherwise

Casa Sueli Carneiro presente no Festival “Imaginando o avesso”

Aconteceu entre 4 a 6 de setembro de 2026, em Oslo, Noruega, o Imagining Otherwise (Imaginando o avesso).

Um programa de três dias no Teatro Negro Nórdico e arredores, que reúne práticas artísticas contemporâneas, arte sonora, música e pesquisa de arquivo em um formato de exposição ao vivo.

As performances apresentadas servem como um lembrete instigante de que a restituição não se resume à devolução de objetos do patrimônio cultural, mas também envolve reconfigurar, reabilitar e complexificar o discurso em torno da decolonialidade, da restituição e das reparações, e lidar com o desconforto inerente a essas propostas. by @sustainingtheotherwise

𝘛𝘩𝘳𝘰𝘶𝘨𝘩𝘰𝘶𝘵 𝘵𝘩𝘦 𝘵𝘩𝘳𝘦𝘦-𝘥𝘢𝘺 𝘱𝘳𝘰𝘨𝘳𝘢𝘮, 𝘸𝘦 𝘸𝘪𝘭𝘭 𝘩𝘰𝘴𝘵 𝘱𝘦𝘳𝘧𝘰𝘳𝘮𝘢𝘯𝘤𝘦𝘴 𝘵𝘩𝘢𝘵 𝘮𝘰𝘷𝘦 𝘪𝘯 𝘢𝘯𝘥 𝘰𝘶𝘵𝘴𝘪𝘥𝘦 𝘰𝘧 𝘕𝘰𝘳𝘥𝘪𝘤 𝘉𝘭𝘢𝘤𝘬 𝘛𝘩𝘦𝘢𝘵𝘳𝘦 𝘪𝘯 𝘖𝘴𝘭𝘰, 𝘰𝘧𝘵𝘦𝘯 𝘩𝘪𝘨𝘩𝘭𝘪𝘨𝘩𝘵𝘪𝘯𝘨 𝘤𝘰𝘯𝘯𝘦𝘤𝘵𝘪𝘰𝘯𝘴 𝘣𝘦𝘵𝘸𝘦𝘦𝘯 𝘈𝘧𝘳𝘪𝘤𝘢 𝘢𝘯𝘥 𝘪𝘵𝘴 𝘮𝘢𝘯𝘺 𝘥𝘪𝘢𝘴𝘱𝘰𝘳𝘢𝘴. 𝘛𝘩𝘪𝘴 𝘶𝘯𝘧𝘰𝘭𝘥𝘦𝘥 𝘪𝘯 𝘵𝘩𝘦 𝘤𝘰𝘭𝘭𝘢𝘣𝘰𝘳𝘢𝘵𝘪𝘰𝘯 𝘣𝘦𝘵𝘸𝘦𝘦𝘯 @𝘢𝘭𝘪𝘤𝘦𝘺𝘢𝘳𝘥 𝘢𝘯𝘥 𝘚𝘶𝘴𝘵𝘢𝘪𝘯𝘪𝘯𝘨 𝘵𝘩𝘦 𝘖𝘵𝘩𝘦𝘳𝘸𝘪𝘴𝘦 𝘢𝘳𝘰𝘶𝘯𝘥 𝘢 𝘴𝘩𝘢𝘳𝘦𝘥 𝘪𝘯𝘵𝘦𝘳𝘦𝘴𝘵 𝘪𝘯 𝘵𝘩𝘦 𝘤𝘰𝘯𝘵𝘦𝘮𝘱𝘰𝘳𝘢𝘳𝘺 𝘢𝘯𝘥 𝘩𝘪𝘴𝘵𝘰𝘳𝘪𝘤𝘢𝘭 𝘪𝘮𝘱𝘭𝘪𝘤𝘢𝘵𝘪𝘰𝘯𝘴 𝘰𝘧 𝘮𝘢𝘴𝘬𝘪𝘯𝘨, 𝘶𝘯𝘮𝘢𝘴𝘬𝘪𝘯𝘨, 𝘢𝘯𝘥 𝘱𝘦𝘳𝘧𝘰𝘳𝘮𝘢𝘵𝘪𝘷𝘪𝘵𝘺 𝘸𝘪𝘵𝘩𝘪𝘯 𝘊𝘢𝘳𝘪𝘣𝘣𝘦𝘢𝘯 𝘢𝘯𝘥 𝘞𝘦𝘴𝘵 𝘈𝘧𝘳𝘪𝘤𝘢𝘯 𝘱𝘳𝘢𝘤𝘵𝘪𝘤𝘦𝘴.

🌱🌱The artist Waldane Walker’s work responds to this ongoing research with his performance Mas Spiral, which takes place on Saturday 5 September at 5pm in front of Nordic Black Theatre, Oslo. Alongside Waldane Walker, the artists A k u z u r u, Luanda Carneiro Jacoel, and Damien Ajavon will also contribute to Saturday’s program. The program will close with a DJ session by Selecta Harmony and Trinidadian food by Simone Belfon at Nordic Black Theatre.

Please reserve your tickets via the website of Nordic Black Theatre.

Imagining Otherwise is part of Sustaining the Otherwise— a collaborative research and artistic project which explores questions of restitution by @sustainingtheotherwise

You’re all invited on Sunday, September 6th, for Day 3 of Imagining Otherwise. Throughout the day, we will host performances that move in and outside of Nordic Black Theatre in Oslo. The program concludes with two multi-sensory, site-specific performances and a closing concert.

The featured performances serve as a compelling reminder that restitution is not only about returning cultural heritage objects, but also about reconfiguring, rehabilitating and complicating the hi discourse around decoloniality, restitution, and reparations, and sitting with the discomfort of those propositions.

With contributions by artists Robel Temesgen, Rehema Chachage, Bafana Isaac Nhlapo, Solo Diarra, Neo Muyanga and Cliff Moustache.

🌱🌱Please reserve your tickets (FREE) via the website of Nordic Black Theatre.

Imagining Otherwise is part of Sustaining the Otherwise—a collaborative research and artistic project which explores questions of restitution, reparation and transformation, which was initiated by curators Amal Alhaag & Selene Wendt in 2023.

With generous support from Nordic Culture Fund (Globus), Arts and Culture Norway, and The Agency for Cultural Affairs, City of Oslo. by @sustainingtheotherwise

You’re all invited on Saturday, September 5th, at Nordic Black Theatre for Day 2 of Imagining Otherwise. Throughout the day, we will host performances that move in and outside of Nordic Black Theatre in Oslo. The four immersive performances take us from ecological restitution and repair through the prism of healing, archives, rituals and ancestral technologies. Here, the power of performance as a method to negotiate the space between history, place, and self, and the choreography of sound and movement, can be seen as acts of resistance that effectively transform the topic of restitution from conversation to action.

With contributions by artists A k u z u r u, Luanda Carneiro Jacoel, Damien Ajavon and Waldane Walker. The program will be closed with a DJ session by Selecta Harmony and Trinidadian food by Simone Belfon at Nordic Black Theatre.

🌱🌱Please reserve your tickets (FREE) via the website of Nordic Black Theatre.

Imagining Otherwise is part of Sustaining the Otherwise—a collaborative research and artistic project which explores questions of restitution, reparation and transformation, which was initiated by curators Amal Alhaag & Selene Wendt in 2023.

With generous support from Nordic Culture Fund (Globus), Arts and Culture Norway, and The Agency for Cultural Affairs, City of Oslo. by @sustainingtheotherwise

Join us on Friday September 4th at Nordic Black Theatre for Day 1 of Imagining Otherwise. We’ll start the program at 14.00 with Elechi Todd: ‘Carnival as a Conjuring of History and Memory’, a documentary film about a collaboration with Alice Yard, Port of Spain, Trinidad. Following this screening, we’ll host performances by Helena Uambembe, Neo Muyanga and Soñ Gweha.

𝙏𝙧𝙞𝙣𝙞𝙙𝙖𝙙𝙞𝙖𝙣 𝙖𝙧𝙩𝙞𝙨𝙩 𝙖𝙣𝙙 𝙛𝙞𝙡𝙢𝙢𝙖𝙠𝙚𝙧 𝙀𝙡𝙚𝙘𝙝𝙞 𝙏𝙤𝙙𝙙’𝙨 𝙛𝙞𝙡𝙢 𝙛𝙚𝙖𝙩𝙪𝙧𝙚𝙨 𝙖𝙧𝙩𝙞𝙨𝙩𝙞𝙘 𝙖𝙘𝙩𝙞𝙫𝙖𝙩𝙞𝙤𝙣𝙨 𝙖𝙣𝙙 𝙧𝙚𝙛𝙡𝙚𝙘𝙩𝙞𝙤𝙣𝙨 𝙗𝙮 𝘼𝙠𝙪𝙯𝙪𝙧𝙪, 𝙎𝙝𝙖𝙣𝙣𝙤𝙣 𝘼𝙡𝙤𝙣𝙯𝙤, 𝙅𝙚𝙡𝙞𝙡𝙞 𝘼𝙩𝙞𝙠𝙤, 𝘾𝙝𝙧𝙞𝙨𝙩𝙤𝙥𝙝𝙚𝙧 𝘾𝙤𝙯𝙞𝙚𝙧, 𝙌𝙪𝙞𝙣𝙨𝙮 𝙂𝙖𝙧𝙞𝙤, 𝙇𝙪𝙖𝙣𝙙𝙖 𝘾𝙖𝙧𝙣𝙚𝙞𝙧𝙤 𝙅𝙖𝙘𝙤𝙚𝙡, 𝙎𝙮𝙤𝙬𝙞𝙖 𝙆𝙮𝙖𝙢𝙗𝙞, 𝘼𝙢𝙖𝙣𝙙𝙖 𝙏. 𝙈𝙘𝙄𝙣𝙩𝙮𝙧𝙚, 𝙎𝙝𝙖𝙧𝙞 𝙋𝙚𝙩𝙩𝙞, 𝙖𝙣𝙙 𝙍𝙤𝙗𝙚𝙧𝙩 𝙔𝙤𝙪𝙣𝙜.

Imagining Otherwise is part of Sustaining the Otherwise— a collaborative research and artistic project which explores questions of restitution, reparation and transformation, which was initiated by curators Amal Alhaag & Selene Wendt in 2023.

With generous support from Nordic Culture Fund (Globus), Arts and Culture Norway, and The Agency for Cultural Affairs, City of Oslo. by @sustainingtheotherwise

Welcome to 𝕊𝕦𝕤𝕥𝕒𝕚𝕟𝕚𝕟𝕘 𝕥𝕙𝕖 𝕆𝕥𝕙𝕖𝕣𝕨𝕚𝕤𝕖: 𝕀𝕞𝕒𝕘𝕚𝕟𝕚𝕟𝕘 𝕆𝕥𝕙𝕖𝕣𝕨𝕚𝕤𝕖,, a three-day festival program at Nordic Black Theatre in Oslo, Norway. 𝕀𝕞𝕒𝕘𝕚𝕟𝕚𝕟𝕘 𝕆𝕥𝕙𝕖𝕣𝕨𝕚𝕤𝕖 actively engages with the topic of restitution by centralizing performance-based artistic practices that question and confront the tensions of colonial terror and the (im)possibility of reparations, rematriation, and freedom.

The interdisciplinary program brings together contemporary art practice, sound-based art, music, and archival research into a live exhibition format. The featured performances serve as a compelling reminder that restitution is not only about returning cultural heritage objects, but also about reconfiguring, rehabilitating and complicating the discourse around decoloniality, restitution, and reparations, and sitting with the discomfort of those propositions.

𝕎𝕚𝕥𝕙 𝕔𝕠𝕟𝕥𝕣𝕚𝕓𝕦𝕥𝕚𝕠𝕟𝕤 𝕓𝕪 𝔻𝕒𝕞𝕚𝕖𝕟 𝔸𝕛𝕒𝕧𝕠𝕟, 𝔸 𝕜 𝕦 𝕫 𝕦 𝕣 𝕦, ℝ𝕖𝕙𝕖𝕞𝕒 ℂ𝕙𝕒𝕔𝕙𝕒𝕘𝕖, 𝕊𝕠𝕝𝕠 𝔻𝕚𝕒𝕣𝕣𝕒, 𝕊𝕠ñ 𝔾𝕨𝕖𝕙𝕒, 𝕃𝕦𝕒𝕟𝕕𝕒 ℂ𝕒𝕣𝕟𝕖𝕚𝕣𝕠 𝕁𝕒𝕔𝕠𝕖𝕝, ℂ𝕝𝕚𝕗𝕗 𝕄𝕠𝕦𝕤𝕥𝕒𝕔𝕙𝕖, ℕ𝕖𝕠 𝕄𝕦𝕪𝕒𝕟𝕘𝕒, 𝔹𝕒𝕗𝕒𝕟𝕒 𝕀𝕤𝕒𝕒𝕔 ℕ𝕙𝕝𝕒𝕡𝕠, 𝕊𝕖𝕝𝕖𝕔𝕥𝕒 ℍ𝕒𝕣𝕞𝕠𝕟𝕪, ℝ𝕠𝕓𝕖𝕝 𝕋𝕖𝕞𝕖𝕤𝕘𝕖𝕟, ℍ𝕖𝕝𝕖𝕟𝕒 𝕌𝕒𝕞𝕓𝕖𝕞𝕓𝕖, 𝕒𝕟𝕕 𝕎𝕒𝕝𝕕𝕒𝕟𝕖 𝕎𝕒𝕝𝕜𝕖𝕣.

𝕀𝕞𝕒𝕘𝕚𝕟𝕚𝕟𝕘 𝕆𝕥𝕙𝕖𝕣𝕨𝕚𝕤𝕖 is curated by Selene Wendt and Amal Alhaag and hosted in collaboration with Nordic Black Theatre in Oslo, Norway as part of 𝕊𝕦𝕤𝕥𝕒𝕚𝕟𝕚𝕟𝕘 𝕥𝕙𝕖 𝕆𝕥𝕙𝕖𝕣𝕨𝕚𝕤𝕖— a collaborative research and artistic project which explores questions of restitution, reparation and transformation.

With generous support from Nordic Culture Fund (Globus), Arts and Culture Norway, and The Agency for Cultural Affairs, City of Oslo. by @sustainingtheotherwise

Resounding Rhizomes Opens on 25th September at NCAI

Resounding Rhizomes, curated by Aude Christel Mgba, look at how seeds and plants move through the world. Travelling across oceans and borders, they take root in new soils, enter new diets and economies, and settle into new rituals and languages. In this process, they participate in transforming the places and the people they reach and are in turn transformed.

Resounding Rhizomes brings together works by Leo Asemota, Rehema Chachage, Jim Chuchu, Letaru Dralega, Fabiana Ex-Souza, Em'kal Eyongakpa, Linda Lamignan, and Maggie Otieno and is developed in partnership with Sustaining the Otherwise as part of the multilocational program Practicing Otherwise.

📅 Opens: 25 September 2026
🗓 On view until: 10 January 2027
📍 Nairobi Contemporary Art Institute

Image Details
Jim Chuchu,
The Camera Cannot Eat,
2025
(video still) by @sustainingtheotherwise