About the Africa Cluster (ARAC)

The Africa Cluster of the Another Roadmap School (ARAC) is a group of scholars and practitioners of artistic and cultural education who work in both formal and informal contexts across the African continent. ARAC was founded to foster Africa-based conversations around the arts and education, and in investing in the development of a shared knowledge base and a structure of mutual learning that will benefit African practitioners and contribute to advances in thinking and practice worldwide.

For detailed information about this initiative, take a look at:

• 
  Our 2018 manifesto
  
• 
  The interview we gave to
  
  START Journal
  
  shortly after the launch in 2015.
  

ARAC can occasionally be found on

Facebook

and

Instagram

.

– – –

ARAC convened for the first time in July 2015 at the Nagenda International Academy of Art & Design (NIAAD) in Namulanda, Uganda

, where delegates spent four days presenting their work and planning a joint programme of theoretical and practice-based research into artistic education in their respective locales.

The members of ARAC have been collaborating ever since on a programme of research into arts educational practices in Africa. This research is critically informed and grounded in historical analysis, particularly with respect to the continent’s colonial heritage. Funding from ProHelvetia Johannesburg, ArtEDU and the Zurich University of the Arts have enabled the cluster to meet to present their research, to give one another feedback and to strengthen their network at colloquia and meetings in

Sao Paolo (2016)

,

Johannesburg (2017)

,

Maseru (2018)

and

Nyanza (2018)

.

In 2019,

Arts Research Africa invited ARAC to partner with them to organise a symposium on artistic education in Africa

. The symposium took place at various ‘sites of knowledge production and speculation’ in and around Johannesburg, including Trackside Creative, Keleketla! Library, and the Wits School of the Arts, in February 2020.

– – –

ARAC has recently begun to develop a series of publications based on the research they have done over the past five years.

Invited Experts:


George Shire (2015 & 2016), Tracey Murinik (2017), Yuk-Lin Cheng (2018).