DECONFINING series: Africa Near and Far

A podcast series exploring connections, narratives, and cultural exchanges between Central-Eastern Europe and South-Eastern Africa.

About the Series

This series features conversations with researchers, artists, and cultural practitioners who reflect on themes of identity, history, and artistic collaboration across continents. The podcast serves as an appendix to the publication “Narratives of Closeness and Distance from Central-Eastern Europe and South-Eastern Africa – a Multicontextual Patchwork“, produced by ART TRANSPARENT Foundation in collaboration with PRO PROGRESSIONE, Nafasi Art Space and the Women’s History Museum Zambia, and together with editors Urszula Markowska-Manista & Natasha Omokhodion-Kalulu Banda.

This podcast series was produced by ART TRANSPARENT Foundation

🎙️ Episode 1: Cultural Narratives & Migration

Mila Bożek talks to:

• Urszula Markowska-Manista – doctor of social sciences in pedagogy, assistant professor at the University of Warsaw, guest professor at the University of Applied Social Sciences in Germany (Darmstad), conducting cross-cultural research in Central Africa, the Horn of Africa, and Central-Eastern Europe;
  
• Karolina Bieniek – foreign policy expert and cultural policy specialist with a PhD in social sciences, director of the Art Transparent Foundation.

🎙️ Episode 2: Art, Spirituality & Bridging Cultures

Mila Bożek talks to:

• Klara Ana Rosa Wojtkowska – musician, director, writer, and shaman. Since 2015 she has been running the Ceremony Theatre, a theatre for people and ancestors, and creates art inspired by spirituality through the Mhondoro Dreams Foundation and Magical Africa. She is the author of the film Nazara - Hunger, a book author and festival director. Her work builds bridges between Zimbabwe and Poland. The publication includes her text ‘How I Learned to Pray. A Fictional Memoir' (pp. 125–150).

🎙️ Episode 3: The Conscious Body & Cultural Expression

Mila Bożek talks to:

• Karolina Marcinkowska – anthropologist and curator exploring body awareness and cultural communication. As part of the Africa Remix educational and research initiative, she has been giving lectures and workshops on the latest socio-cultural body phenomena, intercultural communication and contemporary art in Sub-Saharan Africa in particular for more than 15 years. The publication includes her text "In Search of the Conscious Body. Herstories derived from Polish and Rwandan sources" (pp 67–90).

🎙️ Episode 4: Film, Media & Artistic Exchange

Mila Bożek talks to:

• Jan Moszmanski-Kotwica (Jan Moss) – film director and multimedia artist from Krakow, participating in the Deconfining project in an exchange between artists from Central and Eastern Europe and Africa.

🎙️ Episode 5: Feminism, Literature & African-European Relations

Mila Bożek talks to:

• Joanna Tegnerowicz – expert in African literature and feminist studies with a PhD in sociology, translator, member of the Association of Literary Translators. 
• Karolina Bieniek – cultural and political relations specialist with a PhD in political science, director of the Art Transparent Foundation, co-founder of the Deconfining project.
• Urszula Markowska-Manista – researcher in cross-cultural studies with a PhD in pedagogy.
• Paulina Brelinska-Garsztka – art critic, curator and writer, coordinator of international projects at the Wroclaw Institute of Culture.

This episode explores African literature, feminism, and the intersections between East Africa and Central Europe.