UFA - University of African Future

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UFA - the University of African Futures invites artists who, from a critical approach to the notion of the future, ask themselves what knowledge and what stories we need to imagine the worlds of tomorrow.

Oulimata Gueye, curator of the exhibition.

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From 1830, around thirty writing systems were created in Africa, either with the objective of "adapting" to an external culture, or to resist it and to assert local cultures. They are therefore, for the most part, bearers of a heritage of endogenous graphic forms and impregnated with societal and political contexts. These identity issues have influenced their development and their use, which is still marginalized. Today, designers, artists and experts question their future through their encoding of their typographic design. The UFA poster underlines the propensity of writing systems to be representative of all knowledge and know-how of the African continent. This is why it addresses the question of the future of African knowledge through an exclusively typographical proposal. To go beyond the simple character drawing, three words relating to knowledge and communication were chosen from three different African writing systems. These are considered as sketches: they were drawn in outline. Finally, the Vaï question mark allies with the acronym UFA in order to question and underline the notion of the University of the African Futures, and becomes the landmark of the exhibition.