The Committee for Relevant Art, CORA has announced the 2019 edition of the yearly Lagos Book & Art Festival, LABAF. It is the 21st edition; and will hold for a full week: November 4-10; at the official home of the festival, Freedom Park, Lagos Island and other venues around the city.
The edition is dedicated to the memory of the multimedia artist, David Herbert Dale, who passed on in the morning of Tuesday, August 6, 2019.
“This year’s festival theme is “EMERGE… Breaking into the NEW;” and it is a natural sequel to the themes of the past two editions of the festival: ERUPTIONS: Global Fractures and the Our Common Humanity (2017) and RENEWAL: Towards a World that Works for All (2018)”, announced Kennii Ekundayo, Communication Manager for CORA and the spokesperson for the Festival.
The 31-odd events that will feature in the week-long festival will use the written word, the published text, The Book, and the rest of the arts, to examine the possibilities that the world may emerge from its deeply entrenched divides. What can literary arts tell us about Nigeria’s emergence around 20 years of Nigeria’s democracy; the shifting political events and discourses around the continent; as well as development in/around global politics.
“EMERGE… is premised on the notion of breaking free from the shackles of social, political, economic and cultural factors that inhibit the progress of the individual and the nation”, explained Ms. Ekundayo.
The conversations will engage literature, in fiction and non-fiction modes, that construct the narratives of “Break Out”, the egg-hatching type of break out, around humanity, the community, the nation state and the globe.
Jahman Anikulapo, Programme Chairman of CORA and the Director of LABAF says that “the concept of using fictional and non-fictional works to highlight the process of nation building have been part of the central philosophy of the Lagos Book and Art Festival (LABAF) since its birth in 1999 to mark the return of Nigeria to democratic governance after over three decades of military regimes”.
Michelle Obama’s Becoming and Keith Richards’ Not Quite an Insider are two of the 11 books selected for the main panels at the Festival.
These are books which speak to the issue of Emergence, the festival’s central thesis.
Headline Books
Rutger Bregman’s Utopia for Realists; Tunde Leye’s Afonja: The Rise; Tosin Gbagi’s Locomotif and Ta-Nehi Coates’ “We Were Eight Years in Office”? are up for discussion by reviewers and some of the authors at the Festival Symposium, which tackles the possibilities of hope.
At the Readers’ Assembly, which engages with the subject: ‘Obstacles to Emergence’, the featured books include Namwali Serpell’s The Old Drift, Pat Utomi’s Why Not? and Dele Farotimi’s Do not Die in Their War.
Obama’s Becoming and Ari Shavit’s My Promised Land are the resource materials for the panel conversation entitled: ‘Narratives of Emergence’.
The Festival’s colloquium tackles the subtheme Breaking into the New, and discusses two books Nnamdi Ezeigbo’s memoirs: The Rise and Rise of Slot and Dan Senor & Saul Singer ‘s Start Up Nation.
The Festival’s increasingly popular talkshop: Keys to the Knowledge Emenomy, features, this year, a conversation around Keith Richards’ new book Not Quite an Insider, By Keith Richards
The Festival grounds are the Kongi’s Harvest Gallery, the Food Court and the Esther’s Revenge Hall, of the Freedom Park on Lagos Island.
