The Black Archives @ OSCAM – Zwart Manifest (2021)
Type: Exhibition Design
Concept: Setareh Noorani and Jelmer Teunissen
Art intervention: Matt Plezier
Client: The Black Archives, BAK, Basis voor Kunst
Photography: Zoë Zandwijken
In this project, we chose to pair an Afrofuturist visual language with the aesthetics of the “construction site.” By using salvaged materials from Rotterdam-based reuse facilities, we turned a budgeted design brief into an ethereal, uplifting experience. The spatial design acts as a physical extension of the Zwart Manifest (Black Manifesto): it is a manifestation and an incantation. It carries the weight of powerful, bilingual truths: “We are not our ancestors” / “We zijn niet onze voorouders”; “The Black community has a long tradition of Black resistance” / “De Zwarte gemeenschap kent een lange traditie van Zwart verzet”; and “We stand upon the shoulders of” / “We staan op de schouders van” an ancestral line of struggle. This space honors the collective effort of seeking room to dream, owning our futures, and making them multiple and deeply connected.
The Zwart Manifest demands change across 12 specific domains, going far beyond a simple invitation to participate in emancipation. Because these demands take many forms, they require diverse environments: spaces for holding, activation, critical thinking, softness, receptivity, listening, and sharing with a broad public. We view architecture and design as a form of “aftercare”: a term used in the Manifesto to describe the work of highlighting, improving, or radically undercutting the inequalities and invisibilities of the spatial status quo. The design offers room for the many voices and bodies encountering the Manifesto. By collaborating closely with the artists, we turned OSCAM’s physical space into distinct zones of holding and activation, allowing the artwork to speak and truly be heard.
At the same time, our material choices critique the easily consumed monumentality of traditional, white exhibition spaces. We continue our ongoing project of deconstructing the “white cube” and its orientation devices by infiltrating it with objects that mimic and question the material facades of power, such as the grid and the pedestal. Through this, the design challenges the way materials are often used by institutions to generate cultural capital, hype, and clout, which ultimately turn into financial capital. By using recycled construction elements, the architecture stands as a fluid, self-critical framework that prioritizes community care over institutional permanence.
