Posters in Action. Swiss-Namibian Co-operation Project on the History of Posters in Namibia

This transnational project between historians, artists and students from the University of Basel, the Museums Association of Namibia and the National Art Gallery of Namibia, aims to finalise research on Namibian visual history, with a particular focus on posters and on reception studies. As such the project, which has seen, amongst others, poster exhibitions in Basel and Windhoek in 2006, is a contribution to a very new and unexplored research field in African Studies. There are but a few publications on the relevant issues available, and social studies on poster histories have up to date been mainly concentrating on America and Europe (including the former USSR) and have rarely considered questions of audiences and consumers. Due to the novelty of this field of research, we chose a strong international and interdisciplinary framework on which to base our collaboration. This has facilitated an ongoing dialogue about visual history in Namibia, and in southern Africa more generally. Workshops and research in Basel and Windhoek in late 2007 and early 2008 will lead to the production of a publication which should stimulate an academic debate about the mechanics of poster production and design, the perceived goals of those commissioning and designing particular posters, the networks of distribution and audience reception, and, finally, questions of the relevance of posters in mobilisation and the production of (African) history as such.

The website www.africanhistory.ch provides more details on the history of the collaborative project.

Key words: African visual history, African posters, public history, Namibian history, liberation struggle, poster design, research collaboration

Partners
In Namibia:
Dr. Jeremy Silvester, Museums Association of Namibia, PO Box 147, Windhoek silvestj@iway.na or museems@iway.na
Joseph Madisia, Director, National Art Gallery of Namibia, Robert Mugabe Ave, Windhoek nagn@mweb.com.na

In Switzerland:
Dr. Dag Henrichsen, Historisches Seminar, Universität Basel, Hirschgässlein 21, 4051 Basel henrichsen.bab@bluewin.ch
Giorgio Miescher, Historisches Seminar, Universität Basel, Hirschgässlein 21, 4051 Basel miescher.bab@bluewin.ch
Lorena Rizzo, Historisches Seminar, Universität Zürich, Karl Schmidt-Str. 4, 8006 Zürich l.rizzo@access.unizh.ch

The photograph depicts Namibian and Basel students at the opening of the exhibition "Plakate im Kampf" / "Posters in the Struggle" (Basler Afrika Bibliographien June-July 2006). The exhibition and follow-up project, including an exhibition in Windhoek (Namibia) in August-September 2006, was generously supported by the SDC / KFPE Programme Echanges Universitaires. Photographer: Martin Toengi (Basel), with kind permission.