Pass Blog
Tam Fiofiri- The Speed of Thought
It is said that Sun Ra introduced the Moog synthesizer to the jazz world. The man who introduced Sun Ra to the Moog is Tam Fiofori, a little known Nigerian journalist, photographer and historian – then Harlem based, but better known in Lagos as “Uncle Tam”. Fiofori is also one of the first critics to write seriously about the most famous citizen of Saturn – his essay in Downbeat Magazine “Sun Ra’s Space Odyssey” (1969) is a founding connection between Ra and the movement that would be known as Afrofuturism. Uncle Tam later invited Sun Ra to Lagos for FESTAC 77, took him to the Kalakuta Republic (Fela wanted the Arkestra to perform at his counter-FESTAC festival at the Shrine, Sun Ra politely declined), and wrote about it all in the pioneering Nigerian journal Glendora Review – read Akin Adesokan’s brief history of Glendora Review here: http://chimurengalibrary.co.za/glendora-review
Tam Fiofori is one of Nigeria’s most accomplished photographers who has chronicled Nigeria’s history in albums of photographs over decades. He was also Sun Ra’s manager.
He is an artist, journalist and veteran, who has written about art, music and culture almost as prolifically as he has photographed them. He is also a filmmaker and media consultant with documentaries like ‘Odum’ and ‘Water Masquerades 1974’ that were screened at FESTAC ’77.
Temitope Kogbe
Temitope Kogbe is a DJ from Lagos with interests in photography, music and African history. Temi also collects vinyl of post-highlife West African music and genres it birthed. Temi’s interest in music started with his dad’s large collection of LPs from the 70s and 80s. His family later moved to Paris during the boom of the Jazz era where he eventually caught the bug, attending as many concerts as he could and taking drum lessons from jazz drummer, Sangoma Everett. Temi …
Pan African Space Station Lands in Lagos
Pan African Space Station at Freedom Park in Lagos, 23rd -26th of June 2016 Launched in 2008 by Chimurenga, the Pan African Space Station (PASS) is a periodic, pop-up live studio; a performance and exhibition space; a research platform and living archive, an internet based radio station. Taking advantage of both the intimacy and unpredictability of the live radio studio, PASS seeks to forge new collaborations across time and space; while also engaging how relationships change and practices evolve. The …
PASS x Kallio Library in Helsinki Daily Runnings: 16 April 2016
The final day of our broadcast from Kallio Library, Helsinki opens with conversations between choreographer, Sonya Lindfors, comic artist, Warda Ahmed and Third Space. This is followed by a presentation on anti-fascist thought by Rab-Rab founder, Sezgin Boykin. Visual artist, David Munoz stepu in next asking What do we owe to what we know? What does what we know, owe to what we don’t know? Then we have Minna Henrikson and Ahmed Al-Nawas in conversation about the 1962 Helsinki Youth Festival. …
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PASS x Kallio Library in Helsinki Daily Runnings: 15 April 2016
On the second day of the broadcast, we open the day’s programme with Ali Akbar Mehta, grandson of Tyeb Mehtas pours his concern over violence on canvas. This is followed by a conversation between Morrocan MC Hosni Boudali and Christopher Wessels After that, writer- director Hassan Blasim in conversation with Ahmed Al-Nawas. Hassan Blasim (born 1973) is an Iraqi-born film director and writer who lives in Finland. He writes in Arabic. Later, Sezgin Boynik, Sergio Castrillón & Taneli Viitahuhta discuss Cornelius Cardew and how he politicized collective involvement with learning …
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Hassan Blasim
Hassan Blasim (born 1973) is an Iraqi-born film director and writer who lives in Finland. He writes in Arabic. Blasim went to Finland as a refugee in 2004 after getting in trouble when making the film The Wounded Camera in the Kurdish area in northern Iraq. He made four short films for the Finnish broadcasting company Yle. His short story collection The Madman of Freedom Square was long-listed for the Independent Foreign Fiction Prize in 2010.[1] His book The Iraqi …
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Hosni Boudali
Hossni Boudali is an mc, singer and musician based in Helsinki. His work during early nineties have been great influence to Finnish hip hop and jazz. He has also directed a musical about the life of musician Fela Kuti.
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Babatunde “Aiyekooto” Akerele
Babatunde “Aiyekooto” Akerele leads a Helsinki-based band called Aiyekooto & Afrobeat International. Nigerian born afrobeat musician, composer, arranger and lead singer Babatunde Akerele aka Aiyekooto (b.1966) moved to Finland in 2005, with the assistance of Finnish colleague, guitar player and recording artist Seppo ”Paarma” Salmi. Back in 2003, in Nigeria, they had released a single together, Falana (mind your own business). It got a positive response and radio play on the local stations. When they settled to live in Helsinki, the …
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PASS x Kallio Library in Helsinki Daily Runnings: 14 April 2016
On the second day of the broadcast, we open the day’s programme with a conversation that attempts to trace the tensions and ties of Brown Womanhood and the Finnish Language with Koko Hubara and spoken word artists Laura Eklund Nhaga & Eden Gebra. More here. This is followed by Sasha Huber, Swiss-Haitian visual artist based in Helsinki who works with performance-based interventions, video, photography, publications, using compressed-air staple gun – while aware of its symbolic significance as a weapon. Next is Koko Hubara with Dope …
Aino and Tricont, live at Chimurenga Library, Helsinki
TRICONT was founded in Helsinki in September 1968 as “a group of people studying the problems of the Third World, world capitalism and imperialism“. Its goal was the “active support for liberation movements and their armed struggle“ by distributing information and organizing events. From 1968 onwards the group published a series of xerox-copied booklets. The magazine/journal TRICONT appeared from 1969 until 1973. Aino Korvensyrjä is an artist and historian engaging for mobility rights. She is currently writing a dissertation on …
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