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New book explores history of club culture across Africa and Europe from 1960 to 2020

November 17, 2020

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A new book explores the history of club culture across Africa and Europe from 1960 to 2020.

Titled Ten Cities, the new 500-page book aims to present “a retrospective look at the significance of clubs as experimental fields and protected spaces”, while much of the world’s clubbing and music venues remain shuttered due to the COVID-19 pandemic.

Moving through chapters from East to West, the book documents club culture through twenty-one essays from twenty-five authors of varying backgrounds, with literary stops in Nairobi, Cairo, Kyiv, Johannesburg, Berlin, Naples, Luanda, Lagos, Bristol and Lisbon. Ten Cities also features an archive of photographs and memoirs – some of which have never been published before.

The book, which has been created by the Goethe-Institut, is out now via Specter Books, and available to purchase here.

(Photo Credit: President Records Ltd present Matata, London, 1971, photo: unknown, (c) President Records Ltd.)

Essays
Nairobi: Mukami Kuria, Joyce Nyairo, Sellanga Ochieng’ (Blinky Bill), Bill Odidi, Peter Wafula Wekesa, Cairo: Maha ElNabawi, Ali Abdel Mohsen, Kyiv: Vitalii Bard Bardetski, Kateryna Dysa, Johannesburg: Rangoato Hlasane, Sean O’Toole, Berlin: Tobias Rapp, Florian Sievers, Naples: Danilo Capasso, Vincenzo Cavallo, Iain Chambers, Luanda: Ângela Mingas, Marissa J. Moorman, Lagos: Mallam Mudi Yahaya, Bristol: Tony Benjamin, Michelle Henning, Rehan Hyder, Lisbon: Rui Miguel Abreu, Vítor Belanciano.
Preface by: Johannes Ebert, Intro by: Johannes Hossfeld Etyang.

Photographs:

Anita Baumann, Beezer, Royce Bett, Tilman Brembs, Giovanni Calemma, Martin Eberle, Mosa’ab Elshamy, Nina Fischer & Maroan el Sani, Max Fonseca, Emmanuel Jambo, Kiluanji Kia Henda, Andreas Langfeld, Musa N. Nxumalo, Eva Maria Ocherbauer, Chris Saunders, Jürgen Schadeberg, Gavin Watson, Tobias Zielony, a.o.

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