The Total Foundation is partnering the Présence africaine exhibition

The Présence africaine: une tribune, un mouvement, un réseau (Présence Africaine: A Forum, A Movement, A Network); exhibition at Université Cheikh Anta Diop in Dakar, Senegal, from March 11 to June 26, 2011. The exhibition originated at the Quai Branly Museum in Paris in 2009.

The exhibition is designed to highlight the key political and cultural influence of Présence Africaine on French-, English- and Portuguese-speaking African intellectuals in the 1950s and 1960s. It explores and analyzes the journal’s role as a catalyst in the first 20 years of its existence.

During this period, Présence Africaine set up a publishing house (1949), produced the Alain Resnais-Chris Marker documentary Les Statues meurent aussi, ou la question de l’Art nègre dans les années 1950 [Statues Also Die] (1953), founded a cultural association (1956), organized two International Congresses of Black Writers and Artists (1956 and 1959), and actively participated in the preparation of the First World Festival of Negro Arts in Dakar (1966).