Art mobile, Lagos, is a gathering for street performances, rituals, discussions, talks, and discoveries for international literary activists and all kinds of art makers. The goal is to meet, engage, discuss, collaborate, network, teach, inspire, share, interact, create and exchange through workshops, film screenings, exhibitions, and symposiums. The idea was conceptualized from the Nigerian doctrine of Odun which portrays how vital energies are transmitted according to time and season in a communal gathering. 

In this gathering meeting, we shall reflect on internal intuitions upon external structures in a conversation to find meaning to existence. We aspire to bring together artistic encounters into different public spaces in the city of Lagos. It is a nonprofit contemporary art meeting with the primary motivation of initiating a dialogue between academics, intellectuals, artists, other cultural practitioners, and the public to reflect on social and political matters. As a cultural hub, we intend to posit African contemporary art in its highly international purview through the aforementioned activities. The activities which would come in diverse approaches through residencies, research, public programs, and publications will merit adventurous addition to art making and critical discourse. This will lead to the new public interest, reawake mobile and public art, inform and cultivate new local and international audiences, and positively impact the community. The dynamism and complexity of the gathering makes it flexible and mobile in nature, as it will pop up in different public spaces, galleries, markets and exhibition halls in the city of Lagos.
 

Our Obligation
While attempting to respond to the recurring questions and challenges faced by African communities, art makers and contemporary African art, we have proactively infiltrated a platform for formative cultural events that will influence positive reconstruction. Through cultural exchanges, we want to get more attention to discussions which are global topics today. Our effort we hope may sensitize the African community and create a network in which artistic and public gatherings collide strengths in public spaces to find a solution to human induced phenomenon.

Theme: SOJI
The title was adapted from the Nigerian slang “Wake-up” as used by daily commuters on the streets of Lagos. The cosmopolitan mega city with her energetic vibes gives birth to such provocative words that inspire her inhabitants to survive her daily hustle, bustle and tussle. We have decided to meditate on this public contemporary history to fabricate an awareness of African communities.
During the gathering we will consciously bring us back to the past while we fast forward to the present in the context of post-colonialism and the significance of African contemporary art in its communities. Africa is confronted with the wits of colonial strength. The social environment of the continent is highly inflated by the disguise of assimilation policies. The nations which were colonies are now culturally engaged with the droplets of colonialist mentality, language, food, mode of dressing, music, religion etc. A virtual proof of colonial heritage. History, culture and traditional experiences determine our political and social environment. However, African contemporary art has integrated and materialized over time with the relationship between the historical and the current vision. This relationship leads us to the future. 

SOJI, our theme for this year, is a connection between history, vision and essence of art in African contemporary society. Taking into consideration how other creatives, artists and communities are responding to the possibilities, challenges and sustainability of art in postcolonial communities. Our idea comes from incorporating Hubert Ogunde and Augusto Boal’s Theatre of the Oppressed which reflects on political and social realities of the period when socio-political practices influence existence. We have decided to activate the relative of culture and politics as interpreted by the two artistic pedigrees. The connectivity and influence of both artistic approaches has helped us to develop this new form. Furthermore, SOJI is a clarion call to neocolonialism and rationalization of the significance of art in modern societies. The integration of history and culture has transformed every community. This is fundamental to the interpretation of the art. It is an ardent phenomenon and recurring matter of discussion for us as we fall in between the intellectual and creative space and social public gatherings. We will facilitate the gathering as a thought provoking mechanism intended to raise questions about such consequences and establish this relationship needed. This integration between our international congregation will open our discourse from a multi-continental perspective and assemble optional possibilities of sustainability of contemporary African art and