Bringing the
Biennale B(l)ack

27 JULY 2023

On May 20, 2023, the 18th International Architecture Exhibition at La Biennale di Venezia opened, curated for the first time by an African curator, Prof Lesley Lokko OBE, AFI’s founder and director. As Abitare noted, ‘the most crucial lesson of this exhibition is that the complexity of climate and demographic challenges requires a fourth dimension to design, that of utopia, thoroughly investigating reality, denouncing its distortions, imagining a better world.’ Over the past two years, Prof Lokko worked with a team of curatorial assistants, researchers and the team at the AFI to deliver the exhibition which has been met with both criticism and acclaim. ‘It was a beautiful, cathartic, rigorous, important Biennale that made so many people feel proud and reflected,’ said Gus Casely-Hayford, Director, V&A East. Architect Patrik Schumacher complained there ‘was no architecture.’ From visa denials to fundraising for participants without access to resources, building a team whilst building a show, this lecture by Prof Lokko, ‘Bringing the Biennale B(l)ack’, will explore the complex challenges, opportunities, mistakes and moments of sublime creativity that the 89 participants in the Biennale brought the world. The exhibition is on in Venice until 26 November 2023, but the vast majority of Africans will not be able to see it. This lecture is the first in a planned series of events on the continent that will showcase and explore the work on display 6,000 miles from ‘home.’