Fun fierce and fantastical African art Wanuri Kahiu
So, my mother’s a pediatrician,
and when I was young,
she’d tell the craziest stories
that combined science
with her overactive imagination.
One of the stories she told
was that if you eat a lot of salt,
all of the blood rushes up your legs,
through your body,
and shoots out the top of your head,
killing you instantly.
(Laughter)
She called it “high blood pressure.”
(Laughter)
This was my first experience
with science fiction,
and I loved it.
So when I started to write
my own science fiction and fantasy,
I was surprised that it
was considered un-African.
So naturally, I asked, what is African?
And this is what I know so far:
Africa is important.
Africa is the future.
It is, though.
And Africa is a serious place
where only serious things happen.
So when I present my work somewhere,
someone will always ask,
“What’s so important about it?
How does it deal with real African issues
like war, poverty, devastation or AIDS?”
And it doesn’t.
My work is about Nairobi pop bands
that want to go to space
or about seven-foot-tall robots
that fall in love.
It’s nothing incredibly important.
It’s just fun, fierce and frivolous,
as frivolous as bubble gum –
“AfroBubbleGum.”
So I’m not saying that
agenda art isn’t important;
I’m the chairperson of a charity
that deals with films and theaters
that write about HIV and radicalization
and female genital mutilation.
It’s vital and important art,
but it cannot be the only art
that comes out of the continent.
We have to tell more stories
that are vibrant.
The danger of the single story
is still being realized.
And maybe it’s because of the funding.
A lot of art is still dependent
on developmental aid.
So art becomes a tool for agenda.
Or maybe it’s because we’ve only seen
one image of ourselves for so long
that that’s all we know how to create.
Whatever the reason, we need a new way,
and AfroBubbleGum is one approach.
It’s the advocacy of art for art’s sake.
It’s the advocacy of art
that is not policy-driven
or agenda-driven
or based on education,
just for the sake of imagination:
AfroBubbleGum art.
And we can’t all be AfroBubbleGumists.
We have to judge our work
for its potential poverty porn pitfalls.
We have to have tests
that are similar to the Bechdel test,
and ask questions like:
Are two or more Africans
in this piece of fiction healthy?
Are those same Africans financially stable
and not in need of saving?
Are they having fun and enjoying life?
And if we can answer yes
to two or more of these questions,
then surely we’re AfroBubbleGumists.
(Laughter)
(Applause)
And fun is political,
because imagine if we have
images of Africans who were vibrant
and loving and thriving
and living a beautiful, vibrant life.
What would we think of ourselves then?
Would we think that maybe
we’re worthy of more happiness?
Would we think of our shared humanity
through our shared joy?
I think of these things when I create.
I think of the people and the places
that give me immeasurable joy,
and I work to represent them.
And that’s why I write stories
about futuristic girls that risk
everything to save plants
or to race camels
or even just to dance,
to honor fun,
because my world is mostly happy.
And I know happiness is a privilege
in this current splintered world
where remaining hopeful
requires diligence.
But maybe, if you join me
in creating, curating and commissioning
more AfroBubbleGum art,
there might be hope
for a different view of the world,
a happy Africa view
where children are strangely traumatized
by their mother’s dark sense of humor,
(Laughter)
but also they’re claiming fun,
fierce and frivolous art
in the name of all things
unseriously African.
Because we’re AfroBubbleGumists
and there’s so many more of us
than you can imagine.
Thank you so much.
(Applause)