I used to wonder why the Area studies schools in the western countries sometimes classified “Asia and Africa” as one category. The thing is, in Asia, we are very unfamiliar with the concept of “Africa.” However, “Africa” plays a pivotal role in European and the United States academies’ construction of Global Art. Therefore, when we discuss modern history, literature, cultural studies, and the international relations, the African writing in English and European languages sometimes becomes a global cultural “interpreter”, that is more crucial than the Asian writing in the West. Based on this understanding, we can see that Africa and the global pan-African culture circles is a the Bermuda Triangle for the Asian practitioners to access global information, which also inspires the speaker’s interest in the field.

Nobuo Takamori is a curator and the director of “Outsiders Factory”, a curatorial collective. Selected exhibitions / curatorial projects include Post-Attitude (2011, Ex Teresa Arte Actual, Mexico DF), South country, South of Country (2012, Zero Station, Ho Chi Minh City & Howl Space, Tainan), The Lost Garden (2014, Eslite Gallery, Taipei), Taiwan International Video Art Exhibition 2014: The Return of Ghosts (Hong Gah Museum, Taipei) co-curated with Prof Gow Jow Jiun, I Don’t Belong (2015, Galleria H., Taipei), Wild Legend (2015, Jumin Museum, Jinshan) , Blue Bird in the Labyrinth: A Walk from Japanese Modern Art to Asia Contemporary Art Scene (2016, Galerie Nichido Taipei), Tobacco, Carpet, Lunch Box, Textile Machinery and Cave Men: the Narratives of Craftsmanship and Technologies in Contemporary Art (2017, Hong Gah Museum, Taipei), Is/In-Land: Mongolian Taiwanese Contemporary Art Exchange Project (2018, 976 Art Gallery, Ulaanbaatar, Kuandu Museum of Fine Arts, Taipei), The Middleman, the Backpacker, the Alien Species and the Time Traveler (2019, TKG+, Taipei).

“Oceans and the Interpreters: A Research Project on the Pan-African Contemporary Art” is sponsored by National Culture and Arts Foundation