UNDER GROUND Contemporary Art

blaxTARLINES deploys “fractal curating”, a method that zooms in and out across nested spaces and time signatures. This is extended through Duplex Exhibition Models, enabling bi-directional exchange of live projects between Venice and external sites. Within these tonal registers, blaxxRADIO, and blaxxMEDIA function as open-source portals staging interviews, pre-recorded sonic content (linked to our podcast channel), music playlists, and livestream infrastructures connecting Venice, Kumasi, Kampala, and other “railroad stations” as simultaneous viewing, streaming, and listening centres. blaxxLIBRARY, sub-titled On Ghosts, Resurrections, and Debris from by-passed Futures, anchors a multi-sensory haptic space. It features objects, sound, books, ephemera, braille texts, murals, weaver-loom performance, installations, video and sonic archives, digitized exhibition brochures, magazines, documents, theses, and more. This tactile dimension is further emphasized through a homage to Lionel Idan, designer of the Boku loom (a modern adaptation of the kente loom incorporating a warp roller), and the Affortey [Invaloom], designed for wheelchair users or persons with paraplegia. . . Visit our blaxxMEDIA portal: / Visit our blaxxRADIO podcast channel: / . . . . Produced with the support of Teiger Foundation @teigerfoundation , in partnership with American Friends of Zeitz MOCAA, APALAZZOGALLERY @apalazzogallery , Mercedes Vilardell, Archive Books @archivebkj , Compound House Gallery @compoundhousegallery , VODO Arts Society @vodoarts , UNDER GROUND Kampala @underground8808 , SCCA Tamale @sccatamale , Red Clay @redclay_studio , and Lara Facco P&C @larafacco_press . #blaxtarlines #blaxtarlineskumasi #BiennaleArte2026 #InMinorKeys

For Biennale Arte 2026 by Koyo Kouoh, the Underground Railroad—a historic network that engineered the emancipation of enslaved people, is the muse of blaxTARLINES. By analogy, blaxTARLINES serves as a contemporary system of “underground railroads,” “stations,” “havens”, “conductors,” “fugitives” and “escorts.” The blaxTARLINES UNDERGROUND RAILROAD cartography is composed of several layers: Tracy Naa Koshie Thompson's food map; allegorised Underground Railroad routes; constellation of blaxTARLINES solidarity network across five continents; Goddy Leye's sound installation; kąrî'kạcha seid'ou's poem 'Boundaries, Sores, Scars' (1998); and quadruple screens dubbed EXHIBITING EXHIBITIONS: AFTERLIVES OF LANDMARK blaxTARLINES EXHIBITIONS (video archives, sonic archives, exhibition brochures, texts, etc.) Cartography: 3D topography generated from macro-image of pounded fufu and crystalline structures from Jollof and Wheat with 2D tracing of microstructure contours by Thompson @tracynkthompson . Conceived by seid’ou and Kwasi Ohene-Ayeh (IUB) @iubizzle . Co-designed by Thompson, Francis Essel Etetere @iametetere , and Gideon Hanyame @hanyame22 . Photo courtesy of blaxTARLINES KUMASI. Produced with the support of George Buma Ampratwum, Bernard Akoi-Jackson, and Ibrahim Mahama. Poem: kąrî'kạchä seid’ou, Boundaries, Sores, Scars, durational poem, 1998, Fumbisi, 2026, Venice Translation credits: Standard Italian Translation: Gioia Guerzoni Appreciation: Rebecca deMarchi @rebecca_dema , Gloria Pagliani & Manuel Bauer @manuel.bbaauueerr Sound installation: Goddy Leye (1965-2011), untitled, 2009, wood, glass, millet, speaker cone, amplifier, mp3 file, USB flash drive. Produced with the support of Teiger Foundation @teigerfoundation , in partnership with American Friends of Zeitz MOCAA, APALAZZOGALLERY @apalazzogallery , Mercedes Vilardell, Archive Books @archivebkj , Compound House Gallery @compoundhousegallery , VODO Arts Society @vodoarts , UNDER GROUND Kampala @underground8808 , SCCA Tamale @sccatamale , Red Clay @redclay_studio , and Lara Facco P&C @larafacco_press . #blaxtarlines #blaxtarlineskumasi #BiennaleArte2026 #InMinorKeys #followthedrinkinggo

“After the revolution, who is going to pick up the garbage on Monday morning?” —Mierle Laderman Ukeles, 1969 “Who shall be Artists and who shall be Servants in the world to come? Or shall we all be artists and all serve?” —W. E. B. Du Bois, 1920 You may call us an open-source art coalition or an art-labour movement. Both designations fit the bill. But we are also a pedagogical experiment, a support hub, a sharing economy, and an underground emancipation network—a growing alliance of Harriet Tubmans, Peg Leg Joes, and other “railroad conductors" and escorts. We are hosted by Ghana’s foremost art college at the Kwame Nkrumah University of Science and Technology (KNUST), Kumasi, but our “railroad stations” are dispersed across five continents. Our contribution to the 61st International Art Exhibition of La Biennale di Venezia explores “fugitivity,” “Non-Reciprocal Gifting,” strangeness, and radical pedagogy as entry points into Koyo Kouoh’s In Minor Keys. We deploy Fractal Curating by zooming-in and zooming-out nested spaces and time signatures. We also explore Duplex Exhibition Models—bi-directional exchange of live projects between Venice and its outside. Within these frameworks, we install our open-source recipes blaxxRADIO and blaxxMEDIA as portals staging interviews, pre-recorded sonic content referring back to our podcast channel, music playlists, and livestream setups where Venice, Kumasi, Kampala and other “railroad stations,” respectively double as viewing and streaming centres. Our haptic blaxxLIBRARY, sub-titled On Ghosts, Resurrections, and Debris from by-passed Futures anchors a space of multi-sensory engagement staging objects, sound, video installations, exhibited exhibitions, interactive archival displays, murals, books, weaver-loom performance installations, and more. Indeed, the subjunctive is our future, our past, our present, our joy! • 'SLOW DOWN: C̶A̶T̶T̶L̶E̶ BATTLE AHEAD' blaxTARLINES at Biennale Arte 2026 by Koyo Kouoh Produced with the support of Teiger Foundation, in partnership with American Friends of Zeitz MOCAA, APALAZZOGALLERY, Mercedes Vilardell, Archive Books, Compound House Gallery, VODO Arts Society, UNDER GROUND Kampala

SLOW DOWN: C̶A̶T̶T̶L̶E̶ BATTLE AHEAD, 2026  blaxTARLINES KUMASI at Biennale Arte 2026 by Koyo Kouoh Multimedia installation: wooden shelves, wooden rack, wooden tables, wooden stools, headphones, flatscreen monitors, MP3 devices, books, sound installation, variable dimensions, mural, fabric. Portals: blaxxRADIO  | blaxxLIBRARY  | blaxxMEDIA  | blaxTARLINES UNDERGROUND RAILROAD STATIONS (Cartography) 61st International Art Exhibition – La Biennale di Venezia, In Minor Keys Photos by:  blaxTARLINES KUMASI, _AVZ: Andrea Avezzù, _JS: Jacopo Salvi, _MZO: Marco Zorzanello, _LZB: Luca Zambelli Bais Courtesy: La Biennale di Venezia Produced with the support of Teiger Foundation @teigerfoundation , in partnership with American Friends of Zeitz MOCAA, APALAZZOGALLERY @apalazzogallery , Mercedes Vilardell, Archive Books @archivebkj , Compound House Gallery @compoundhousegallery , VODO Arts Society @vodoarts , UNDER GROUND Kampala @underground8808 , SCCA Tamale @sccatamale , Red Clay @redclay_studio , and Lara Facco P&C @larafacco_press . #blaxtarlines #blaxtarlineskumasi #BiennaleArte2026 #InMinorKeys #apalazzogallery

Following the objects’ crease lines, Mayhem is a vertical Wall of images constructed with the unfolded images remolded into new shapes. Whereas the images in this Photomontage can not be reconciled by sight with each of the former objects in shape, and later by form–are pretty one and the same thing. Thank for your support during the installation @nantumeviolet @amazin.astro @victorianabulime2 @louisedeininger Photo credits @kisa.kilungi @victorianabulime2 @hassan_issah1

This is 21.03.2026-30.03.2026, Is experiment with a photography process that uses objects to register images. Green Cyanotype treated Chip Paper, Vanguard papèr and Watercolor paper is folded into Origami objects. The objects are made in a number and are exposed to Sunlight between three to fifteen minutes, to turn into various shades of Cyane Blue. The exposed surfaces of the folded objects turn Blue while the concealed surfaces remain White.  When unfolded, the objects leave behind an index of their construction; the permanent Crease lines by each fold and Blue Pigments that are the direct physical trace of UV Light onto the Paper surface by a reduction of Iron when Ammonium III Citrate reacts with Potassium III Hexe Cyanoferrate. Thank for your support during the installation @amazin.astro @victorianabulime2 @nantumeviolet @louisedeininger Photo credits @kisa.kilungi @victorianabulime2 @hassan_issah1

"Art, Matter, and Memory: Allan Kyakonye and Frederick Ebenezer Okai in Dialogue" This article examines the material-driven practices of Allan Kyakonye (Uganda) and Frederick Ebenezer Okai (Ghana), and how they work with ordinary substances to think with memory and history. Methodologically, it combines close readings, exhibition analysis, hands-on curatorial fieldwork, and side-by-side comparison. The study focuses on Kyakonye’s medallion-and-cameo portraits—egg tempera on fire scorched tinfoil—and Okai’s sculptural reworkings of indigenous pottery and alchemical clay experiments staged with immersive digital technologies. Authors: Nantume, Violet, and kąrî'kạchä seid'ou. E-Journal of Humanities, Arts and Social Sciences 6, no. 12 (2025): 3187 - 3203, /10.38159/ehass.202561222 IMAGES 1 & 2: Installation view from Museum of Selves exhibition (2021) Curated by @julia.gyemant Photo: @james_wasswa_ IMAGES 3-5: Installation views from Earthy Structures and Contingent Breakthroughs. Curated by Kwasi Ohene-Ayeh @iubizzle Photos: @f.e.okai

The blaxTARLINES collaborative exhibition titled SILENT INVASIONS: THE ART OF MATERIAL HACKING (2023-2024) has found its afterlife as a themed creative component published in Issue 2-3, Volume 59 (2024) of de arte journal.  This issue of de arte edited by Leandra Koenig-Visagie, Nicola Cloete, and Obakeng Kgongoane is a combined one composed of four peer-reviewed research articles--authored by Rory Bester & Nontobeko Ntombela, John Parkington, Joe Alfers & Alice Parkington, Louis Aghogah Wihbongale & Donna Yuniyui Nsha, and Anne Fitchett--and a themed creative component, for which a separate editorial by the guest editors, Violet Nantume, Julia Gyemant, and Kwasi Ohene-Ayeh, follows.  The themed creative component is rooted in SILENT INVASIONS: THE ART OF MATERIAL HACKING (2023-2024), which explores curating as a radical, relational practice. Emerging from a collaboration between blaxTARLINES KUMASI and UNDER GROUND Contemporary Art, it redefines “hacking” and “gifting” as insurgent, non-extractive gestures that cultivate collective authorship, resist commodification, and build counter-infrastructures. The contributions affirm solidarity across borders and refuse editorial erasure—most notably in its insistence on naming Palestine—positioning art as a tool for world-making, memory, and survival. The themed segment features texts by Amutuhaire Tusiime Tutu Bororana, Irene Piloya, Sascia Bailer, Akosua Odeibea Amoah-Yeboah, A. S. Bruckstein Çoruh, Fiona Siegenthaler, Lisa C. Soto, Kabena Godelive Kasangati, Kwasi Ohene-Ayeh, kąrî'kạchä seid'ou, Tracy Naa Koshie Thompson, Jonathan Okoronkwo, Bernard Akoi-Jackson, Adjo Daiki Apodey Kisser, Matt Kayem, Joseph Mary Bukenya, Bright Ackwerh, Larissa Tiki Mbassi, and Nontobeko Ntombela.  Read more here: /toc/rdat20/59/2-3  #blaxtarlines #undergroundcontemporaryart #blaxtarlineskumasi #dearte #

Several studio visits for weeks, deep with @blaxtarlines @underground8808 , and @vodoarts teams — and we ended it with a public art talk . Thank you to everyone who showed up, spoke up, and lifted the culture with us. #Blaxtarline #vodoartsociety #Underground8088 #ArtTalk #PublicArt #StudioVisits #ArtCommunity #CreativeCulture #ArtCollective #ArtistsOfInstagram #ArtMovement #CultureShifters #ContemporaryArt #Underground #ArtLife #ArtEvents

Here is some brief bios on tonight's Public Art Talk by visiting curators from Ghana. ICT Hub, Nakawa, Kampala Uganda Samuel Baah Kortey is a multi-sensory artist and researcher from Ghana whose practice engages with the intersections of memory, materiality, and postcolonial experience. His work draws from historical archives, quotidian encounters, and the cyclical presence of death, decay, and struggle—elements that he transforms into objects and experiential environments charged with critical reflection. Through this process, Kortey situates himself as an observationist, tracing and interrogating the residual imprints of colonial modernity within contemporary social life. His practice foregrounds the politics of seeing and remembering through acts of documentation, sonic and visual recording, and a sustained engagement with the visual culture of the street. Dr. Kwasi Ohene-Ayeh is a curator, critic, and teacher based in Kumasi, Ghana. He is a key member of blaxTARLINES KUMASI whose work is inspired by the coalition’s precept to "transform art from the status of commodity to gift". Ohene-Ayeh is curator of the group show Fragments of A World After Its Own Image (2025) at APALAZZOGALLERY, Italy; co-curator of TRANSFER(S), Ibrahim Mahama’s site-responsive exhibition project in Germany/Ghana (2023); and co-curator of the 35th edition of the Ljubljana Graphic Arts Biennale in Slovenia (2023-2024) as a member of Exit Frame Collective. His current research observes the exhibition as a pedagogical situation while positing the curator as a vanishing mediator. Adisenu-Doe holds a BFA in Painting and Sculpture from Kwame Nkrumah University of Science and Technology (KNUST), Ghana, and an MA in Art Market and Appraisal, Professional Practice from Kingston University, UK, accredited by the Royal Institute of Chartered Surveyors (RICS). Nuna has founded Compound House Gallery in Ghana and beyond his curatorial work, he is an independent art market researcher and advisor, consulting for artists and galleries. He has also lectured at KNUST’s Department of Painting and Sculpture on the art market.

We are proud, yet again, to be hosting members of blaxTARLINES KUMASI in Uganda. A curatorial team composed of Samuel Baah Kortey, Dr. Kwasi Ohene-Ayeh and Nuna Adisenu-Doe are visiting artists' studios, artists' run projects, collectives, galleries and art schools in Kampala, Masaka and Kisoro. The curatorial team's research interest in Uganda precedes exhibition projects and artistic collaborations in the near future. The curators will make public presentations of their artistic and curatorial work in a forum open and free to the public on 9 December 2025 at ICT Hub Auditorium, located at New Portbell Rd. in Nakawa, Kampala Uganda. This exchange programme is collectively organised by UNDER GROUND and Vodo Art Society and coordinated by Nakato Maria @_njuchi and Yiga Joshua @yigart_joshua_m @samuelkorteybaah @nunadoe @blaxtarlines @critlab @compoundhousegallery @samuelkorteybaah @_exitframe @nunadoe @icthub

It is with profound sorrow and deep regret that we received the news of the passing of the artist, author, teacher, and cultural elder of Samia–Bugwe, Buluma Ochungo Mordecai. Born on 7 September 1934, Buluma joined the ancestors on 8 November 2025, after living courageously with a long-term struggle with hypertension. He passed away peacefully, surrounded by his loving family. He is survived by two wives, thirteen children, sixty-three grandchildren, and nineteen great-grandchildren, all of whom carry forward his legacy of wisdom, creativity, and cultural devotion. The artists’ community feels deeply honoured to have worked alongside Buluma over the past four years. In that time, we witnessed not only his gentleness and generosity, but also the quiet yet powerful resilience that defined his life and work. We extend our heartfelt condolences to his family and all who were touched by his enduring spirit. May his memory continue to inspire.