The Power of Culture

A team of four composers from the Sahel has been selected to compose the first opera for that region. The Sahel Opera, which is an initiative of the Prince Claus Fund, is to premiere next May in Mali.

Three international conferences studied cultural diversity in June. The objective was one and the same: finding the anecdote to the negative consequences of globalization.

The golden jubilee of the Bandung conference in Indonesia on 24 April was the platform used to launch a new Chinese objective, namely that of assuming the mantle of leadership of the developing countries on the international stage.

Musical super-stars from the African continent performed on 12 and 13 March 2005 in the Senegal capitol Dakar to support the fight against malaria. The two-day benefit festival, with performers including Youssou N'Dour, Baaba Maal, Orchestra Baobab, Manu Digango and Salif Keita, was primarily intended to draw attention to the dangers of malaria and the need to improve prevention.

The exhibition Looking Both Ways brings work by twelve African artists from the Diaspora together in the Gulbenkian Museum in Lisbon. Three of the artists explain what it means to work outside of the African continent while simultaneously looking at 'home'.