Missla Libsekal, born in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia, is an independent art writer and curator based in Vancouver, Canada. Her recent projects include the Creating Art Archives (2021) conference and the Beyond What We See. Once upon a time, once upon a future (2021) exhibition, presented at Les Abattoirs, Musée - Frac Occitanie Toulouse.
She is the founder of Another Africa (2010 - 2016), a digital platform for writing on and about African and Afro-Diasporic experiences and imaginaries. Her writings on existing and emerging lexicons in contemporary visual practice have been published in The Africa Report, The Guardian, Art Africa, SAVVY art journal, and more.
How will we share the earth? In the past 150 years, humans have significantly altered the planet. Today we singularly occupy key landscapes. The loss of habitat for 1 in 8 animal and plant species, puts 1 million species in direct danger of extinction. In the face of these mass extinctions, what kinds of processes help human and non-human species sustain themselves? And furthermore, what kinds of land-use approaches promote biodiversity in water, air and land? Our biodiversity and sustainability crisis is rooted in extractive systems: colonialism and global capitalism. What alternative practices offer a toolbox towards reconciliation and a course correction out of our dire trajectory? And which histories of living in the land produced diverse environments that in turn created diverse communities? If it is indeed possible for humans to govern and have positive perennial effects on the landscape, which kinds of archives, libraries and knowledge keepers contain these bodies of critical, usable pasts?
This area of curatorial research is for Missla Libsekal a long-term investigation builds on the exhibition Beyond What We See. Once upon a time, once upon a future (Les Abattoirs, Musée - Frac Occitanie Toulouse, 2021) which considers how artistic strategies can historicise our present-day planetary entanglements and illuminate alternate imaginaries.