Dialogue Forum with Zohra Opoku and Emeka Alams on « Virtual/material: Fashion & design as logbooks of the imagination », FRI, 26 April 2013, 20.00h, GLS

On Friday, April 26th, 2013 at 20.00 h AfricAvenir and Iwalewa Haus Bayreuth invite to a discussion and screen show of works by the internationally renowned artists Zohra Opoku and Emeka Alams on "Virtual/material: Fashion & design as logbooks of the imagination". Textiles and fashion are here discussed as logbooks: Both for past processes, as well as for imaginations of the future. In the talk, artist Zohra Opoku (Berlin/Accra) and designer Emeka Alams (New York/Abidjan) will engage in a discussion with Katharina Fink about their artistic work and the role of textiles within it: Which realms intersect in the structure of material? How do design, fashion and installation enable access to histories beyond colloquial version of the past? How are textiles, fashion and future connected? Can art worn on the body, performed and installed serve as entry point into ‘other’ spaces. Can it, while being situated within the globalized fashion world – as e.g. in the concept of a “label”? What can the virtual space be in this regard?

Their work is currently presented within the exhibition “virtual/material:logbuch mode”, shown at Iwalewa-Haus Bayreuth, from 25.4.-25.8.2013: www.virtualmaterial.com

Zohra Opoku
Zohra Opoku is a German/Ghanaian fashion designer, working in fashion and art. Her work spans the mediums of textile objects, installations, designs, photography and street actions. She derives inspiration from African symbols, traditions and style resources wherever she finds them. In an interactive way, she associates these influences by merging them artistically to give a new perspective on the same context. This thereby creates stronger visibility as the relationship with the initial context is even more tangible to the viewer. The overriding question behind her artistic actions is the question of diverse identities. More info on Zohra’s work here: http://www.zohraopoku.com/

Emeka Alams
Emeka Alams is a fashion designer and artist mostly working in New York and Abidjan. His label “Gold Coast Trading Company” uses fashion and Afrikan aesthetics as a way to imagine a new stylistic language: www.before1444.com.
More info on Emeka’s work here: http://before1444.com/news/history/

Moderation
Katharina Fink is a researcher and cultural organiser. She works for Bayreuth University’s Iwalewa-Haus and runs an agency for encounters of all sorts: himmelgrün. Fashion and design fascinate her due to the complexities and paradoxes they materialize and evoke. She curated the show “logbuch mode” at Iwalewa-Haus, another project of importance at the moment is the conference "heute.gedenken" she hosts. www.iwalewa.uni-bayreuth.de; www.himmelgruen-ereignisse.de; http://heutegedenken.wordpress.com

Ort
GLS Sprachenzentrum, Lounge
Kastanienallee 82
10435 Berlin Prenzlauer Berg
U 2 Eberswalder Str.
U 8 Rosenthaler Platz
M1 Schwedter Str.