Designed by Pierre-Christophe Gam, “Sankara, The Upright Man” is a mix-media installation offering an apocryphal retelling of the life of Thomas Sankara, the late president of Burkina Faso.

The work can be found here: https://www.pierre-christophe.com/the-upright-man

Thomas Sankara was a military captain, a humanist, a pan-Africanist, an ecologist and a feminist who served as President of Burkina Faso from 1983, until his death in 1987, at 37 years old. A visionary and a charismatic figure, Sankara was a leading African voice for the global fight against imperialism and neo-colonialism, launching one of the most ambitious programs for social and economic justice ever attempted on the African continent.

Informed by interviews with family members, classmates, Ministers, and peers, the work is a thoroughly-researched and deeply intimate expression of Sankara as a torch-bearer of Africa’s destiny towards self-determination.

Always excited by creative deployment of the African archive, Decolonising The Archive caught up with Pierre-Christophe Gam to understand more about the motivations guiding the process of engaging the past to transform the present.

Music Credits:

Afrikan Sciences: https://afrikansciences.bandcamp.com/

Reggie Dokes: http://www.eureka-artists.com/reggiedokes/

Steve Spacek: https://stevespacek.bandcamp.com/

Bookworms: https://www.youtube.com/watch?time_continue=76&v=jTkqtFxHC0c

Groundings #8: Hero - In conversation with Frances-Anne Solomon

GroundingsBy Decolonising The ArchiveOct 17, 2019