THE BLACK ORPHEUS EXHIBITION

On July 29, 2026, the Black Orpheus Exhibition opened at the J.P. Clark Building, University of Lagos.

The exhibition traces the rise of modern African writing in the 1950s and 60s, and the role of Black Orpheus, the journal co-founded in Ibadan in 1957 by Ulli Beier and Janheinz Jahn.

Drawn from the Janheinz Jahn Archive in Berlin, it gathers the words and worlds of writers including Amos Tutuola, Chinua Achebe, Wole Soyinka, Christopher Okigbo, Gabriel Okara, and Léopold Sédar Senghor.

The exhibition comes to Lagos through the BOBIB Trilateral Research Linkage Group, a collaboration between Berlin, Ibadan, and Bordeaux, hosted here at the Institute of African and Diaspora Studies.

The J. P. Clark Centre, a structure adjacent to the Faculty of Arts,
University Of Lagos

Mon - Fri: 8.00AM to 4.00PM

iads@unilag.edu.ng
myakubu@unilag.edu.ng

ABOUT IADS

On August 9, 2017 IADS UNILAG, was inaugurated, following a series of events attended by staff and students including invited guests and the media. The former Vice Chancellor of the University of Lagos, Prof. Rahamon Bello accompanied by the University Management was on hand to unveil the IADS signpost at the J. P. Clark Centre.

This was followed by an inauguration lecture entitled “The Global Migration Crisis: Identity, Ethical and Economic Entailment”, which was delivered by Prof. Abolade Adeniji of the Department of History and International Studies, Lagos State University.