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Ekow Eshun

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Ekow Eshun
Born (1968-05-27) 27 May 1968 (age 56)
London, England
NationalityBritish
EducationKingsbury High School;
London School of Economics
Occupation(s)Writer, journalist, broadcaster, curator
Known forCultural commentary
Websiteekoweshun.co.uk

Ekow Eshun (born 27 May 1968) is a British writer, journalist, broadcaster, and curator.

Eshun rose to prominence as a trailblazer in British culture. He was the first Black editor of a major magazine in the UK (Arena Magazine in 1997)[1] and continued to break ground as the first Black director of a major arts organisation, the Institute of Contemporary Arts in London.

Described as a "cultural polymath" by The Guardian,[2] he has been at the heart of creative culture in Britain for several decades, authoring books, presenting TV and radio documentaries, curating exhibitions, and chairing high-profile lectures.

Eshun curated In the Black Fantastic at London's Hayward Gallery in July 2022,[3] a landmark exhibition of visionary Black artists exploring myth, science fiction and Afrofuturism. The show was critically acclaimed, being called "Spectacular from first to last" by The Observer.[4] The Evening Standard said: "There is "There is unlikely to be a better show this year."[5]

As Chairman of the Fourth Plinth Commissioning Group[6] in Trafalgar Square, Eshun leads one of the most important public arts programmes in the world.

Biography

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Ekow Eshun was born in London, England. His family are Fante from Ghana. His father was a supporter of Kwame Nkrumah and was working at the Ghanaian High Commission in London when Nkrumah was overthrown in a military–police coup in February 1966.

Although three years (1971–74) of Eshun's childhood were spent in Accra, for the most part, he was brought up in London,[7] He attended Kingsbury High School in North West London, later reading history and politics at the London School of Economics (LSE).[8][9] During his time at LSE, he edited both Features and Arts for the student newspaper The Beaver.[10]

Eshun was the director of the Institute of Contemporary Arts in London from 2005 to 2010, during a period of turmoil for the organisation.[11][12] Under his directorship, attendance figures rose by 38 per cent[13] from 350,000 to 470,000, and two young artists shown in ICA galleries, Enrico David and Mark Leckey, went on to be nominated for the Turner Prize.

Eshun has appeared as a critic on Saturday Review on BBC Radio 4 and formerly on BBC Two's The Review Show.[14] He appeared in 2009 in the television advertisements for Aviva (formerly Norwich Union). He has also often appeared on More4's topical talk show The Last Word.[15] In 2019, he was the captain of the London School of Economics team on Christmas University Challenge.[16] In October 2021, he wrote and presented White Mischief, a three-part documentary on BBC Radio 4 on the history of whiteness.[17]

Eshun's memoir, Black Gold of the Sun: Searching for Home in England and Africa, published in 2005, deals with a return trip to Ghana, Ghanaian history, and matters of identity and race.[18] Black Gold of the Sun was nominated for an Orwell Prize in 2006.[19]

He is the younger brother of writer Kodwo Eshun.

Curator

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Since 2015, Ekow Eshun has worked as an independent curator working internationally on shows which often focus on race and identity.

The Time Is Always Now

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The Time is Always Now is a show that Eshun curated for the National Portrait Gallery,[20] opening in February 2024. It is a major study of the Black figure – and its representation in contemporary art. The exhibition showcases the work of contemporary artists from the African diaspora, including Michael Armitage, Lubaina Himid, Kerry James Marshall, Toyin Ojih Odutola and Amy Sherald, highlighting the use of figures to illuminate the richness and complexity of Black life. As well as surveying the presence of the Black figure in Western art history, it examines its absence – and the story of representation told through these works, as well as the social, psychological and cultural contexts in which they were produced. The exhibition will be on display at The Box in Plymouth from 29 June-29 September 2024 before touring to the USA.

In the Black Fantastic

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Eshun curated In the Black Fantastic at the Hayward Gallery in London in July 2022,[3] a landmark exhibition of visionary Black artists exploring myth, science fiction and Afrofuturism. The show was critically acclaimed, being called "Spectacular from first to last" by The Observer.[4] The Evening Standard said: "There is unlikely to be a better show this year."[5] The show also toured to the Kunsthal in Rotterdam.

To accompany his book and exhibition, In the Black Fantastic, Eshun curated a season of visionary films exploring Black existence through sci-fi, myth and Afrofuturism at the British Film Institute.[21]

We Are History

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We Are History, was a group exhibition at Somerset House in London [22] offering a different perspective on humanity's impact on the planet by tracing the complex interrelations between today's climate crisis and legacies of colonialism. The exhibition, curated by Eshun, won Time Out London's Sustainable Event of the Year prize in 2021.[23]

Africa State of Mind

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Africa State of Mind was an internationally acclaimed survey show heralding a new era in African photography. Africa State of Mind gathered together the work of an emergent generation of photographers from across Africa, including both the Maghreb and sub-Saharan Africa. It is both a summation of new photographic practice from the last decade and an exploration of how contemporary photographers from the continent are exploring ideas of "Africanness" to reveal Africa to be a psychological space as much as a physical territory – a state of mind as much as a geographical place. It first opened at New Art Exchange in Nottingham,[24] before touring to MOAD San Francisco, 2020,[25] and Rencontres des Arles, 2021.[26] Africa State of Mind was also the name of a book of African photography[27] that Ekow Eshun published with Thames and Hudson.

Made You Look

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Made You Look[28] at The Photographers' Gallery in London was a group show on photography, style and Black dandyism. Describing this exhibition in Wallpaper magazine, Eshun said: "It is about confounding expectations about how black men should look or carry themselves in order to establish a place of personal freedom; a place beyond the white gaze, where the black body is a site of liberation not oppression."[29]

Writer

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Creative non-fiction

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Eshun's memoir, Black Gold of the Sun: Searching for Home in England and Africa, published in 2005, deals with a return trip to Ghana, Ghanaian history, and matters of identity and race.[18] Reviewing the book for the New Statesman, Margaret Busby said: "His rich memoir, which comes fittingly adorned with a golden jacket designed by Chris Ofili, attempts to answer the question: 'Where are you from?' Eshun's search for home and identity is sometimes achingly poignant, a story of semi-detachment, of fragmentation and duality, which must have been cathartic to write. 'There is no singularity to truth' is its refrain."[30] Black Gold of the Sun was nominated for an Orwell Prize in 2006.[19]

British publishing house Hamish Hamilton has acquired the rights to Eshun’s new book The Stranger, [31] described as a “‘powerfully intimate, richly imagined’ investigation into Black masculinity.” The Stranger is “structured around the stories of several remarkable Black men, from the 19th to 21st century and across the global diaspora” and “will set out a ‘radical’ exploration of Black male identity and experience. From Victorian actor Ira Aldridge to philosopher and revolutionary Frantz Fanon to infamous rapper Tupac Shakur, each chapter will find its subject “standing at a crossroads, his life and the society around him in flux”. The book will be published in hardback, e-book and audio in 2024.

Art books

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In the Black Fantastic is a richly visual book that assembles art and imagery from across the African diaspora that embraces ideas of the mythic and the speculative. Neither Afrofuturism nor Magic Realism, but inhabiting its own universe, In the Black Fantastic brings to life a cultural movement that conjures otherworldly visions out of the everyday Black experience – and beyond – looking at how speculative fictions in Black art and culture are boldly reimagining perspectives on race, gender, identity and the body in the 21st century.The book includes an introductory text by Eshun, and extended essays by Eshun, Kameelah L. Martin and Michelle D. Commander.

Africa State of Mind is a mesmerizing,[32] continent-spanning survey of the most dynamic scenes in contemporary African photography, and an introduction to the creative figures who are making it happen. Dispensing with the western colonial view of Africa in purely geographic or topographic terms, Eshun presents Africa State of Mind in four thematic parts: Hybrid Cities; Inner Landscapes; Zones of Freedom; and Myth and Memory.

Eshun has contributed many essays to major art publications. He wrote an essay for Seeing by Duro Olowu.[33] Eshun focuses on Olowu's role within Britain’s black and Afro-Caribbean creative community. He is also a contributor to Fashioning masculinities : the art of menswear.[34] which accompanied a major exhibition at The V&A.

Journalism and cultural commentary

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Eshun is an influential writer delivering timely, insightful analysis of complex issues of culture, art and identity. He writes for publications including The New York Times, The Financial Times and The Guardian, and has been a Contributing Editor at Wallpaper. For example, he wrote about Basquiat for The New York Times in 2017.[35]

From his early days as the Assistant Editor of iconic style magazine The Face, and then editor of Arena men's magazine, Eshun has written influential thought pieces exploring style, masculinity, race and the changing face of modern Britain, and has interviewed iconic figures from Prince and Bjork to Neneh Cherry and Hilary Mantel. In early autumn 1996, Eshun interviewed Prince at his Paisley Park complex outside Minneapolis.[36]

Broadcaster

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Dark Matter: A History of the Afrofuture (BBC4, 2022)

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Presented by Eshun, the film Dark Matter: A History of the Afrofuture (BBC4, 2022)[37] is an exploration – from Jean-Michel Basquiat to Grace Jones – of how black artists use the sci-fi genre to examine black history and imagine new, alternative futures.[37]

White Mischief (BBC Radio 4, 2021)

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In White Mischief, a three-part radio series for BBC Radio 4, Eshun traces where whiteness came from and how its power has remained elusive.[38]

Exploring the Black Atlantic (Tate, 2021)

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In this four-part mini-series, Eshun examines the rich and boundless ways in which artists have engaged with the concept of the "Black Atlantic.[39]

Works

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Books

Selected essays

References

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  1. ^ "The face of British style; interview: Ekow Eshun". The Independent. 2 March 1997. Retrieved 2 May 2023.
  2. ^ Sudjic, Deyan (13 March 2005). "Is It Mission Impossible?". The Observer. ISSN 0029-7712. Retrieved 2 May 2023.
  3. ^ a b Jansen, Charlotte (4 August 2022). "Stepping Into the Expansive Worlds of Black Imagination". The New York Times. ISSN 0362-4331. Retrieved 2 May 2023.
  4. ^ a b Cumming, Laura (3 July 2022). "In the Black Fantastic review – spectacular from first to last". The Observer. ISSN 0029-7712. Retrieved 2 May 2023.
  5. ^ a b Luke, Ben (28 June 2022). "In the Black Fantastic review: Unlikely be a better show this year". Evening Standard. Retrieved 2 May 2023.
  6. ^ "Fourth Plinth winners for 2022 and 2024 | London City Hall". www.london.gov.uk. Retrieved 2 May 2023.
  7. ^ Black Gold of the Sun by Ekow Eshun[dead link‍]
  8. ^ BBC profile.
  9. ^ Ekow Eshun profile Archived 29 June 2011 at the Wayback Machine, Evening Standard.
  10. ^ "The Beaver", LSE Digital Library.
  11. ^ Edemariam, Aida (27 August 2010). "Ekow Eshun: 'It's been a tough year …'". The Guardian.
  12. ^ Brown, Mark (12 January 2010). "Gregor Muir to be new ICA chief". The Guardian. Retrieved 12 January 2011.
  13. ^ Edemariam, Aida (27 August 2010). "Ekow Eshun and Alan Yentob to quit after ICA survives crisis". The Guardian. ISSN 0261-3077. Retrieved 2 May 2023.
  14. ^ Saturday Review website.
  15. ^ "Television and Radio". Evening Standard. 9 October 2007. Retrieved 1 January 2019.
  16. ^ "Christmas University Challenge alumni line-up announced". BBC. Retrieved 1 January 2019.
  17. ^ "BBC Radio 4 - White Mischief". BBC. Retrieved 14 November 2021.
  18. ^ a b Gbadamosi, Gabriel (9 July 2005). "Looking for myself". The Guardian. (Review of Black Gold of the Sun.)
  19. ^ a b "About – Ekow Eshun".
  20. ^ "The Time is Always Now: Artists Reframe the Black Figure - National Portrait Gallery". www.npg.org.uk. Retrieved 2 May 2023.
  21. ^ Oloukoï, Chrystel (5 July 2022). "In the Black Fantastic: a conversation with Ekow Eshun". BFI. Retrieved 2 May 2023.
  22. ^ "We Are History". Somerset House. 3 August 2021. Retrieved 2 May 2023.
  23. ^ Lloyd, Kate (6 December 2021). "Revealed: Time Out London's 2021 Best of the City award winners". Time Out London. Retrieved 2 May 2023.
  24. ^ "Africa State of Mind". New Art Exchange | NAE. Retrieved 2 May 2023.
  25. ^ "Virtual Tour | Africa State of Mind--Part 1 | MoAD". www.moadsf.org. Retrieved 2 May 2023.
  26. ^ d'Arles, Les Rencontres. "AFRICA STATE OF MIND". www.rencontres-arles.com. Retrieved 2 May 2023.
  27. ^ a b "Africa State of Mind". thamesandhudson.com. Retrieved 2 May 2023.
  28. ^ "Made You Look: Dandyism and Black Masculinity | The Photographers Gallery, Thu 14 Jul 2016 - Sat 24 Sep 2016". thephotographersgallery.org.uk. Retrieved 2 May 2023.
  29. ^ updated, Jessica Klingelfuss last (15 August 2016). "Dandyism, race and masculinity collide at The Photographers' Gallery". wallpaper.com. Retrieved 2 May 2023.
  30. ^ Busby, Margaret (30 May 2005), "Homing instinct", New Statesman.
  31. ^ "Ekow Eshun, Author of Africa State of Mind, Has a New Book Coming Out". brittlepaper.com. Retrieved 2 May 2023.
  32. ^ "Africa State of Mind - Contemporary Photography Reimagines a Continent by Ekow Eshun". Impressions. Retrieved 2 May 2023.
  33. ^ "Duro Olowu: Seeing". DelMonico Books. Retrieved 2 May 2023.
  34. ^ "Fashioning masculinities : the art of menswear / edited by Rosalind McKever & Claire Wilcox ; with Marta Franceschini ; [contributors, Christopher Breward, Gus Casely-Hayford [and 20 others]].". Wellcome Collection. Retrieved 2 May 2023.
  35. ^ Eshun, Ekow (22 September 2017). "Bowie, Bach and Bebop: How Music Powered Basquiat". The New York Times. ISSN 0362-4331. Retrieved 2 May 2023.
  36. ^ "Purple Pain: revisit an interview with Prince at Paisley Park". The Face. Vol. 3, no. 2. March 1997. Retrieved 2 May 2023.
  37. ^ a b "Dark Matter - A History of the Afrofuture (BBC)". YouTube. Retrieved 17 May 2023.
  38. ^ "White Mischief", BBC Radio 4, 2021.
  39. ^ "What is the Black Atlantic? – The Black Atlantic: Episode 1 | Tate", 2022.
  40. ^ "In the Black Fantastic". thamesandhudson.com. Retrieved 17 May 2023.
  41. ^ Eshun, Ekow (29 June 2006). Black Gold of the Sun.
  42. ^ Naeem, Asma, ed. (8 August 2023). The Culture: Hip Hop & Contemporary Art in the 21st Century. Gregory Miller & Company. ISBN 978-1-941366-54-7.
  43. ^ Green, Myrah Brown; Buchhart, Dieter; Coglan, Niam; Dakouo, Armelle; Dempster, Heike; Eshun, Ekow; Felice, Claire di; Godin, Philippe; Gomado, Selasie (26 January 2023). Steininger, Florian (ed.). The New African Portraiture: The Shariat Collections (1st ed.). Köln: Walther & Franz König. ISBN 978-3-7533-0306-2.
  44. ^ "Fashioning Masculinities: Official Exhibition Book | Hardback Book | V&A Shop". www.vam.ac.uk. Retrieved 17 May 2023.
  45. ^ Addy, Campbell (14 April 2022). Feeling Seen: The Photographs of Campbell Addy (1st ed.). Prestel. ISBN 978-3-7913-8846-5.
  46. ^ "Joy Gerrard". Cristea Roberts Gallery. Retrieved 17 May 2023.
  47. ^ "Mark Bradford: Ágora PT". Loja de Serralves. Retrieved 17 May 2023.
  48. ^ "Publications". Thomas Dane Gallery. Retrieved 17 May 2023.
  49. ^ "Publication: Raphaël Barontini - Mariane Ibrahim Publications". Mariane Ibrahim Gallery. Retrieved 17 May 2023.
  50. ^ "Amoako Boafo - Publications". Mariane Ibrahim Gallery. Retrieved 17 May 2023.
  51. ^ Beckwith, Naomi (27 May 2020). Duro Olowu: Seeing (1st ed.). München London New York: Prestel. ISBN 978-3-7913-8638-9.
  52. ^ Pardo, Alona (20 March 2020). Masculinities: Photography and Film from the 1960s to Now: Liberation through Photography (1st ed.). Munich London New York: Prestel. ISBN 978-3-7913-5951-9.
  53. ^ Eshun, Ekow; McCartney, Linda (9 October 2019). Golden, Reuel (ed.). Linda McCartney. The Polaroid Diaries: MCCARTNEY, LINDA, POLAROIDS (Multilingual ed.). Köln Paris: Taschen. ISBN 978-3-8365-5811-2.
  54. ^ Akomfrah, John; Eshun, Ekow (1 October 2017). Banning, Kass (ed.). John Akomfrah: Purple (Curve): 6. London: Barbican Art Gallery. ISBN 978-0-9957082-2-8.
  55. ^ Kehinde Wiley - the World Stage Jamaica (Hardback) – via Waterstones.
  56. ^ "Chris Ofili (hardback) | Books | Tate Shop | Tate". shop.tate.org.uk. Retrieved 17 May 2023.
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