It’s a hard sell but Africa must invest in art and imagination

Building an arts centre in Uganda, in a pandemic, was never going to be easy but it’s crucial to our post-Covid future

I’ve been raising funds for a building project: not a hospital, not a school, but an arts centre.

It’s not an easy sell at the best of times but add in a pandemic and the fact that I’m in Africa and, according to the current rules of financial engagement, art is the very lowest of priorities.

According to the people who decide these priorities, art does not create thousands of jobs, or keep people from dying, and it doesn’t “scale up”.

I used to work in development, so I understand where this mindset comes from, but now that I have worked in arts and culture, I see repeatedly how much Ugandan society misses out on because we do not prioritise our art. Read more