Conference : Green or Grey Urban Jungles : What Place for Plants in Nigeria's Cities?
On the 7th of June, The French embassy in Nigeria in partnership with IFRA-Nigeria organized a conference titled: “Green or Grey Urban Jungles : What Place for Plants in Nigeria's Cities?»” featuring Jomi Bello (director of WAFFLESNCREAM), Emilie Guitard (Anthropologist at CNRS/ coordinator of INFRAPATRI, a project about knowledges and attachments to urban plants in Sub-Saharan Africa), Folu Oyefeso (photographer, member of « Save Our Green Spaces Ibadan » group), Théo Lawson (architect and founder of Freedom Park), Iyabode Aboaba (Manager of Freedom Park). Tabia Princewill acted as a moderator.
To open this event, the artist Ruth Mahogany recited a poem written for this occasion.
The roundtable started from the premise that tar and concrete seem to be the raw materials of Africa's major urban areas, starting with Nigeria, making them places where nature has little or no place. Yet trees, forests and gardens have long been part of Nigerian urban landscapes. The aim of this roundtable is to show and understand how these vegetated spaces can be places of memory, commerce, relaxation, sociability or even worship, where thinkers and civil society actors committed to ecology meet to rebuild urban spaces. Where traders from the informal sector are on the lookout for potential customers. Where religious leaders and their followers practice their religion. Or simply where local residents who come together to take a breather and exchange news about the area. They are also places where young people can get involved, notably through the development of urban sports such as skateboarding and the creation of skateparks in the city's parks.
During one hour and a half the speakers exchanged on the above basis before opening the floor to some questions from the public.
Ruth Mahogany closed the roundtable by performing a couple of songs, including her songs 'Hope' that reminds us about how the circles of life could be draining, 'Changer' a song that speaks on playing out parts and 'Waiting Fo' a song whose theme touches on acting before time runs out.
Following the roundtable, an exhibition organized by Emilie Guitard, the sister Chevalme (visual artists), and Obayomi A. Anthony was launched at the Alliance Française.
The Exhibition titled “Igi’Badan. Living with trees in Ibadan” An exhibition between art and science presented a work conducted since 2017 by Emilie Guitard with the visual artists Delphine and Elodie Chevalme as well as with the photographer Obáyomí A. Anthony. They have started together a collaboration between arts (drawing, cyanotype, photography) and sciences (anthropology) in Ibadan, in south-west Nigeria, on local knowledge and the relations of the inhabitants to the vegetation present in the city.
Founded in the first half of the 19th century, Ibadan now has a population of around 4 milion living in area of about 700km2, mostly Yoruba. Despite this high population, the city is still home to a large number of trees of various species, some of which are centuries old, and to several large, wooded areas of various types: wooded hills, botanical gardens, private parks, cemeteries, wastelands, etc.
Combining drawings, nocturnal and naturalistic photographs, cyanotypes on textiles and extracts from the notebooks filled during an ethnographic survey carried out since 2018 with invaluable help of Adedeji Adebayo, Leye Komofale and Fred Akinyemi, this exhibition offers an insight into the rich relations that Ibadan Inhabitants have with the vegetation that surrounds them.
Several news articles have been written about this event:
https://thenationonlineng.net/french-embassy-ifra-nigeria-commemorate-environment-week/
https://guardian.ng/environment-week-stakeholders-seek-more-green-areas-in-cities/
https://www.msn.com/en-xl/news/other/experts-seek-more-green-spaces-in-nigerian-cities/ar-BB1oHtkE
https://tribuneonlineng.com/environmental-experts-want-more-green-areas-across-nigeria/
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