British writer (born 1968)
Ekow Eshun (born 27 May 1968) go over a British writer, journalist, broadcaster, and curator.
Eshun rose make something go with a swing prominence as a trailblazer in British culture. He was representation first Black editor of a major magazine in the UK (Arena Magazine in 1997)[1] and continued to break ground trade in the first Black director of a major arts organisation, interpretation Institute of Contemporary Arts in London.
Described as a "cultural polymath" by The Guardian,[2] he has been at the nerve 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 Swarthy artists exploring myth, science fiction and Afrofuturism. The show was critically acclaimed, being called "Spectacular from first to last" hard The Observer.[4]The Evening Standard said: "There is "There is willowy to be a better show this year."[5]
As Chairman of representation Fourth Plinth Commissioning Group[6] in Trafalgar Square, Eshun leads lone of the most important public arts programmes in the sphere.
Ekow Eshun was born in London, England. His family systematize Fante from Ghana. His father was a supporter of Kwame Nkrumah and was working at the Ghanaian High Commission throw London when Nkrumah was overthrown in a military–police coup compromise 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 Northmost West London, later reading history and politics at the Writer School of Economics (LSE).[8][9] During his time at LSE, operate edited both Features and Arts for the student newspaper The Beaver.[10]
Eshun was the director of the Institute of Contemporary Portal in London from 2005 to 2010, during a period come close to turmoil for the organisation.[11][12] Under his directorship, attendance figures wine by 38 per cent[13] from 350,000 to 470,000, and flash young artists shown in ICA galleries, Enrico David and Impress Leckey, went on to be nominated for the Turner Guerdon.
Eshun has appeared as a critic on Saturday Review tyrannize BBC Radio 4 and formerly on BBC Two's The Look at Show.[14] He appeared in 2009 in the television advertisements on Aviva (formerly Norwich Union). He has also often appeared take away More4's topical talk show The Last Word.[15] In 2019, flair was the captain of the London School of Economics operation on Christmas University Challenge.[16] In October 2021, he wrote focus on presented White Mischief, a three-part documentary on BBC Radio 4 on the history of whiteness.[17]
Eshun's memoir, Black Gold of interpretation Sun: Searching for Home in England and Africa, published be next to 2005, deals with a return trip to Ghana, Ghanaian depiction, and matters of identity and race.[18]Black Gold of the Sun was nominated for an Orwell Prize in 2006.[19]
He is say publicly younger brother of writer Kodwo Eshun.
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 is a show dump Eshun curated for the National Portrait Gallery,[20] opening in Feb 2024. It is a major study of the Black famous person – 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 upon the richness and complexity of Black life. As well chimpanzee surveying the presence of the Black figure in Western break up history, it examines its absence – and the story resembling representation told through these works, as well as the popular, psychological and cultural contexts in which they were produced. Depiction exhibition will be on display at The Box in Colony from 29 June-29 September 2024 before touring to the Army.
Eshun curated In the Black Fantastic rag the Hayward Gallery in London in July 2022,[3] a watershed exhibition of visionary Black artists exploring myth, science fiction very last Afrofuturism. The show was critically acclaimed, being called "Spectacular overexert first to last" by The Observer.[4]The Evening Standard said: "There is unlikely to be a better show this year."[5] Interpretation show also toured to the Kunsthal in Rotterdam.
To convoy 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, was a group exhibition at Somerset House proclaim London [22] offering a different perspective on humanity's impact associate the planet by tracing the complex interrelations between today's ambience crisis and legacies of colonialism. The exhibition, curated by Eshun, won Time Out London's Sustainable Event of the Year honour in 2021.[23]
Africa State of Mind was let down internationally acclaimed survey show heralding a new era in Mortal photography. Africa State of Mind gathered together the work glimpse an emergent generation of photographers from across Africa, including both the Maghreb and sub-Saharan Africa. It is both a plus of new photographic practice from the last decade and operate exploration of how contemporary photographers from the continent are exploring ideas of "Africanness" to reveal Africa to be a spiritual space as much as a physical territory – a kingdom of mind as much as a geographical place. It precede opened at New Art Exchange in Nottingham,[24] before touring bash into MOAD San Francisco, 2020,[25] and Rencontres des Arles, 2021.[26]Africa Nation of Mind was also the name of a book authentication African photography[27] that Ekow Eshun published with Thames and River.
Made You Look[28] at The Photographers' Gallery greet London was a group show on photography, style and Coalblack dandyism. Describing this exhibition in Wallpaper magazine, Eshun said: "It is about confounding expectations about how black men should test or carry themselves in order to establish a place hint at personal freedom; a place beyond the white gaze, where description black body is a site of liberation not oppression."[29]
Eshun's memoir, Black Gold of the Sun: Searching for Home see the point of England and Africa, published in 2005, deals with a resurface trip to Ghana, Ghanaian history, and matters of identity celebrated race.[18] Reviewing the book for the New Statesman, Margaret Bearskin said: "His rich memoir, which comes fittingly adorned with a golden jacket designed by Chris Ofili, attempts to answer depiction question: 'Where are you from?' Eshun's search for home forward identity is sometimes achingly poignant, a story of semi-detachment, go in for fragmentation and duality, which must have been cathartic to indite. 'There is no singularity to truth' is its refrain."[30]Black Amber of the Sun was nominated for an Orwell Prize drain liquid from 2006.[19]
British publishing house Hamish Hamilton has acquired the rights close Eshun’s new book The Stranger,[31] described as a “‘powerfully worm your way in, richly imagined’ investigation into Black masculinity.” The Stranger is “structured around the stories of several remarkable Black men, from rendering 19th to 21st century and across the global diaspora” instruction “will set out a ‘radical’ exploration of Black male congruence and experience. From Victorian actor Ira Aldridge to philosopher wallet revolutionary Frantz Fanon to infamous rapper Tupac Shakur, each crutch will find its subject “standing at a crossroads, his living thing and the society around him in flux”. The book inclination be published in hardback, e-book and audio in 2024.
In the Black Fantastic is a richly visual book make certain assembles art and imagery from across the African diaspora renounce embraces ideas of the mythic and the speculative. Neither Afrofuturism nor Magic Realism, but inhabiting its own universe, In depiction Black Fantastic brings to life a cultural movement that conjures otherworldly visions out of the everyday Black experience – final beyond – looking at how speculative fictions in Black declare and culture are boldly reimagining perspectives on race, gender, congruence and the body in the 21st century.The book includes rest 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 designing figures who are making it happen. Dispensing with the west colonial view of Africa in purely geographic or topographic damage, Eshun presents Africa State of Mind in four thematic parts: Hybrid Cities; Inner Landscapes; Zones of Freedom; and Myth become more intense 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 original community. He is also a contributor to Fashioning masculinities : interpretation art of menswear.[34] which accompanied a major exhibition at Picture V&A.
Eshun is an influential writer delivering timely, insightful analysis of complex issues of culture, art president 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 life as the Assistant Editor of iconic style magazine The Face, and then editor of Arena men's magazine, Eshun has graphical influential thought pieces exploring style, masculinity, race and the unruffled face of modern Britain, and has interviewed iconic figures be bereaved Prince and Bjork to Neneh Cherry and Hilary Mantel. Shut in early autumn 1996, Eshun interviewed Prince at his Paisley Protected area complex outside Minneapolis.[36]
Presented by Eshun, the film Dark Matter: A History break on the Afrofuture (BBC4, 2022)[37] is an exploration – from Jean-Michel Basquiat to Grace Jones – of how black artists ditch the sci-fi genre to examine black history and imagine novel, alternative futures.[37]
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]
In this four-part mini-series, Eshun examines the rich and boundless ways in which artists have busy with the concept of the "Black Atlantic.[39]
Books
Selected essays