Medina by Night

Africa is known for its bold, unapologetic use of colour. Stories are told in pigments, tones and hues; a kaleidoscope as diverse as the cultures and peoples of the continent. For the initiative Colours of Africa, a collaborative project with Google Arts & Culture, we asked 60 African creatives to capture the unique spirit of their country in a colour which represents home to them.

The projects they have created are personal and distinct stories of Africa, put into images, videos, texts and illustrations. Each artist has also attempted to articulate what being African means to their identity and view of the world.

Colour:Medina Yellow
Country:Senegal

Artwork Rationale:

Yellow symbolises the story of the quest for a city.
The birth of Medina as a neighbourhood took place in August 1914 when a plague epidemic hit the city of Dakar, which was then under French Colonial rule. Black populations of the Plateau were immediately moved to ‘Xuru Xan’ (Xan Depression), in a new village originally named ‘Ponty-Ville 2’ in reference to William Ponty. An eminent Imam named El Hadj Malick Sy decided to re-name the new village, born under the velleities of segregation. He changed the name from Ponty-Ville 2 to ‘Medina’, as a reference to first Muslim communities that were banished from Mecca.
Medina has grown to become the creative heart of Dakar and Senegal and is the home of contemporary arts, music, sports, literature and cinema. Prominent names of Senegalese art scene were born or influenced by this working class neighbourhood that encapsulates an everlasting memory of the country’s originality.
At night, Medina switches on its signature yellow lights and creates the perfect movie set for conviviality, conversations, laughter and the planting of seeds of ideas. The choice of yellow as our Senegalese colour for this project references alchemy, fertility, vibrance and life force. This space, designed by the French to confine the black populations, has carved its way through time to become a cultural guardian of what might have been lost.
In Medina, language is different, occupation of space is different, in-and-out living is the art de vivre. You’ll find houses where Djibril Diop Mambety wrote works of art, others where Amilcar Cabral had his meetings, places where Youssou Ndour grew up, where Fatimata Coulibaly or Anta Mbow create radical and original art programs to keep children out of the streets. This is a place where families ask graffiti artists to treat their facades as a canvas. Eventually there was so much street art that an open-air street art museum in Medina was created. Artists from around the world have come to paint in this curious space.
Art is a way to immortalise Medina’s radicality and to keep its heritage as a source of inspiration, creation and reflection. This becomes the field from which to explore the immensity of all that is possible, from a free and anchored ground.

What it means to be African

To me, being African means to be at the forefront of building a future in which imagination is a radical seeding and breeding ground. Being African today means looking at my heritage in its entirety and drawing from it the tools for a healthier sense of community.
To be African today is to think and meditate on the creative medium as a means of constructing the continent and adapting to its aspirations, making it worthy for all its inhabitants.

Biography

Selly Raby Kane is a Senegalese fashion designer and a central figure in Dakar's new wave of creative practitioners. She launched her eponymous brand in 2012 and has gradually built a surreal universe around her brand that overturns Senegalese fashion codes and trends.
Kane belongs to a new generation of urban, curious and open-to-the-world artists and designers who are bringing a new energy to Senegalese culture.
Born and raised in the Senegalese capital, she studied at French fashion business school MOD'SPE in Paris and lived in the US before travelling in Africa.
Along the way she developed an eclectic, uninhibited style that owes as much to street artist Banksy as it does to her love of traditional West African textiles.
Through her eponymous label, Kane expresses her strong and rebellious personality, frequently using three-dimensional moulded shapes, bold patterns and unusual materials such as PVC and fake hair.
Pieces of the Alien Cartoon collection have been exhibited at the Louisiana Museum (Denmark), the Vitra Museum (Germany) and Design Indaba (South Africa). In 2016, Selly Raby was chosen as one of the 12 designers working in collaboration with IKEA on the Överallt collection inspired by everyday rituals in urban Africa.
Her avant-garde line has earned the brand international media platforms including WAD magazine, Vogue Italia, Arte, Okay Africa, and Afropunk. Pieces by SRK have been worn by icons such as Beyoncé and Solange Knowles, Nai Palm, Daara-J Family, Tiwa Savage, Lil Mama, and Rokhaya Diallo.