Bongeziwe Mabandla has joined the African Book Festival 2022 taking place at the Nåpoleon Komplex, Berlin from August 26-28.
This year’s programme has been curated by Johannesburg-based Lidudumalingani who is a longtime creative collaborator of Bongeziwe’s. The writer, filmmaker, and photographer has worked on several projects with Bongeziwe, including shooting the cover for his award-winning 2020 album, iimini.
The African Book Festival features leading writers in Africa and its diaspora and has been hosted in Berlin since 2018.
Titled Yesterday.Today.Tomorrow, this year’s programme includes readings, concerts, panel discussions, poetry and comedy. The theme of the 2022 edition explores the connections between writers – the way older writers hold the hand of the young writers when they write, and how, in turn, they too hold the hand of the writers coming after them.
The festival artists come South Africa, which is this year’s country focus, as well as Nigeria, Uganda, Namibia, Tanzania, Germany, Cuba, Portugal, the USA, the United Kingdom, and DR Congo. Writers and poets, many of them award-winning, will be featured alongside musicians, dancers, academia, researchers, actors, visual artists and filmmakers.
The headline artist for 2022 is Margaret Busby CBE – a major cultural figure in Britain and around the world. For a full list of participants head here.
Photo by Jess Sterk Photography
