Curated Highlights: Christine Eyene's Selection from 1-54 New York

Christine Eyene is an art historian, critic and curator. She is a Research Fellow in Contemporary Art at the University of Central Lancashire (UCLan) where she works with artist Lubaina Himid CBE RA on an interdisciplinary art project called Making Histories Visible.

She has curated numerous exhibitions internationally on contemporary African and Diaspora arts, feminism, photography and sound art.

In 2016, with Cameroonian curator Landry Mbassi, she co-founded YaPhoto – Yaounde Photo Network, a project supporting emerging photographers in Cameroon. She is currently developing Bikoka Art Project a new art and education project for the youth and emerging creative talents on a one-hectar rural site in Lolodorf, Cameroon.

www.eyonart.org

Statement on Christine Eyene's 1-54 Curated Highlight

'For this selection, I was mostly drawn towards the young talents. Usually, when I curate an exhibition, I am interested in creating dialogues between different forms and mediums, and explore how works talk to each other. During the selection process, the human figure really captivated me. Representations of the body, especially the black and brown bodies, have been an interest of mine for many years. But this time, I think what spoke to me is the current climate and what we’ve experienced in 2020, and before, that can be summed up in the global Black Lives Matter protests.

What I see in this selection is how artists continue to give visibility to our bodies and presence in Africa and the diasporas. Most interestingly, those figures are shown through the diversity of our experiences, be they set in urban or rural environment, or across gender and religious diversity, through to more abstract approaches allowing us room for imagination.'

– Christine Eyene