A Goal for Africa
April 6, 2007
From Harvard Square to Newbury Street, the MFA to the ICA, Boston is full of great places to find art both from the U.S. and around the world. But this month, one doesn’t have to reach beyond the Tufts campus to catch a glimpse of a different culture; stepping into Aidekman’s Slater Concourse Gallery feels like a step across the ocean to Africa. This April’s Africa Goal exhibition, organized by Tufts senior Hannah Jones and nine international students, brings to Tufts a photo documentary of the team’s incredible three month project across Southern Africa.
From June through August of last summer, the group of students traveled through Southern Africa—from Kenya to Namibia and back—screening live World Cup soccer matches with AIDS awareness videos in towns and villages, reaching those critical demographics in need of HIV education. Backed with support from Tufts University, the Clinton Foundation, the Massachusetts College of Art, MTV’s Staying Alive Foundation, and the Joint United Nations Program on HIV/AIDS (UNAIDS) among many others, the team traveled in two cars carrying with them projectors, tents, and a satellite dish, all of which were put up and taken down in a new location almost every day.
Every evening, the team set up its equipment and invited the town to partake in watching the World Cup matches projected live on a big screen. Each time, the broadcast was greeted with great enthusiasm and excitement. During the day, the team spent most of its time traveling to its next scheduled site, and, as avid soccer players themselves, they often took breaks for roadside soccer games with local children and teams.
The students documented their experience through photographs and eventually even began to collect the homemade soccer balls used by the children they encountered. These balls, made out of rubber, plastic, and fabric were happily traded to the team for brand new store-bought soccer balls.
The photographs, maps, journals and homemade balls the team accumulated make up the Africa Goal exhibition. Like the globetrotting students themselves, who come from the U.S., Kenya, Colombia, Australia, and the United Kingdom, this exhibition has also made its way around the world. Starting at the Massachusetts College of Art, the exhibit then traveled to Nairobi, Kenya, where it was shown at the Village Market gallery as well as the International School of Kenya. Slightly bumped and bruised from all its travels, the exhibition has finally made its way to Tufts.
For Hannah Jones, who graduated from Tufts early this winter, showing the photos here is particularly significant. “It feels great to come back and share my experience of this trip with my friends and professors at Tufts,” said Jones, “One of our sponsors, the Tufts Active Citizenship Grant has helped us make our dream of this trip a reality, and I hope that this exhibition will be a testament to the importance of inspiring and enabling students to follow their dreams of improving communities and addressing issues about which they are passionate.”
If you would like a quick trip to Zambia or Zimbabwe, Malawi or Mozambique, stop by the Slater Concourse Gallery in the Aidekman Arts Center before April 30 to take a look at this exhibit. O
For more information about the trip, the team members’ biographies, and additional photos, visit africagoal.com.