So Be It! Asé! Photographic Echoes of FESTAC ’77 unveils visual documentation of one of the most significant, yet lesser known, cultural events of the twentieth century: the Second World Black and African Festival of Arts and Culture, held in Lagos, Nigeria. Known as FESTAC, this Pan-African festival, which convened in early 1977, brought together around 17,000 artists from African countries and Black diaspora communities across the world.
Curated by Romi Crawford, the exhibition draws from the archives of Roy Lewis, Bob Crawford, and K. Kofi Moyo, three members of the United States delegation to FESTAC.
As members of the Black Arts Movement in Chicago, Lewis, Crawford, and Moyo each embarked on careers documenting momentous social and political developments. Roy Lewis began as a freelance photographer for publications such as Jet and Ebony, and recorded the historic 1974 match between Muhammad Ali and George Foreman in Zaire. Bob Crawford documented Black life on the city’s South Side throughout the 1960s and 70s. Photojournalist K. Kofi Moyo’s extensive archive of street photography and photojournalism chronicles some of the most pivotal moments of the period, including the Chicago uprising after the assassination of Martin Luther King, Jr.
Curator Romi Crawford is interested in "placing these archives side by side, staging the relations and common ground between them to offer a unique opportunity to study animating themes of the FESTAC experience for those American artists who participated as artists and who were also witnesses to their concurrent attendance at FESTAC."
List of North American Delegation of Visual Artists Selected to Participate in FESTAC 1977 in the Jeff Donaldson Archives at the Smithsonian Archives of American Art.
"Interestingly, Moyo, Lewis, and Crawford were invited as FESTAC artists and not necessarily assigned to document the event. The Photographic Echoes exhibit ultimately investigates the tension between these two poles of the photographic craft, --documentary and art photography, which their work, and the photographic genre of Black Arts Movement photography more generally, constantly, steadily, negotiates. Like Jeff Donaldson who helped steward the US FESTAC administrative process, Lewis, Moyo, and Crawford had an interest in collectivizing around art making and the project of black togetherness, prior to FESTAC."
- Romi Crawford
Roy Lewis, FESTAC Participants Leave Lunch Tents, 1977
“We had come on faith, not knowing what was going to happen, but all the artists from all the countries had one thing in common: we wanted it to be a success, we wanted to be all together in one place at least once in our lifetimes. And we did it.”
— Roy Lewis
Roy Lewis, Visual Art Entrance of National Theater, 1977
Roy Lewis (b. 1937, Natchez, Mississippi) is a photographer and journalist whose works have been featured in numerous publications and exhibitions. In the decades since Jet magazine published his portrait of musician Thelonius Monk in 1964, Lewis’s photographs have captured socially and culturally important moments of Black life.
Roy Lewis U.S.A. Participants "Arrive at Lagos Airport", 1977
In 1977, Lewis was invited to exhibit his work as a member of the United States delegation at the Second World Black and African Festival of Arts and Culture (FESTAC ‘77) in Lagos, Nigeria. The artist’s photographs captured the sprawling FESTAC village, and transportation of participants to and from sites like the new National Theater, where many of the cultural events showcased artists, dancers, writers, and musicians, such as Faith Ringgold, Audre Lorde, Stevie Wonder, and Sun Ra. Lewis also contributed work to the widely acclaimed 1995 photo book project, Songs of My People.
Roy Lewis, FESTAC 77 United States of America and Red, Black and Green Flag, 1977
In 1995, Lewis published The Million Man March, a book highlighting the monumental gathering of over 830,000 Black men in Washington, DC. In 2008, Everywhere with Roy Lewis, a traveling exhibition of Lewis’s photography opened at the Essence Festival in Louisiana and has since traveled to the DuSable Museum, Chicago (2011); Armour J. Blackburn University Center Gallery at Howard University in Washington, DC (2013); the Natchez Museum of African American History and Culture in Natchez, Mississippi (2016); among others. Lewis has received numerous awards for photojournalism including, The Exposure Group Maurice Sorrell Lifetime Achievement Award, and honors from the National Press Club and the National Press Photographers Association (NPPA) for Community Service.
ROY LEWIS (b. 1937)
Bob Crawford (1939–2015) was a freelance photojournalist and member of the Black Arts Movement in Chicago best known for documenting Black life on the city’s South Side throughout the 1960s and 1970s. His practice was largely defined by his equal concern for form and Black cultural and sociopolitical content.
Bob Crawford (1939-2015)
Untitled (FESTAC 1977), 1977
Archival inkjet print on Simply Elegant Gold Fibre paper
Image: 8 x 12 inches (20.3 x 30.5 cm)
Sheet: 11 x 14 inches (27.9 x 35.6 cm)
Edition of 3, printed 2023
Bob Crawford (1939-2015)
Untitled (FESTAC 1977), 1977
Archival inkjet print on Simply Elegant Gold Fibre paper
Image: 8 x 12 inches (20.3 x 30.5 cm)
Sheet: 11 x 14 inches (27.9 x 35.6 cm)
Edition of 3, printed 2023
Crawford extensively documented the production of the Wall of Respect, a mural painted by members of the Organization of Black American Culture (OBAC), a collective of Black artists, writers, intellectuals, and activists in 1967. Located on Chicago’s South Side, the outdoor mural featured Black heroes and heroines and served as an important site for gatherings, performances, and political events until its destruction in 1971. Through Crawford’s photographs, the Wall of Respect has remained accessible, underscoring its importance as a site for cultural and political activity as well as a touchstone for artists in the decades since its destruction.
Bob Crawford (1939-2015)
Untitled (Miriam Makeba at FESTAC 1977), 1977
Archival inkjet print on Simply Elegant Gold Fibre paper
Image: 13 1/4 x 20 inches (33.7 x 50.8 cm)
Sheet: 17 x 22 inches (43.2 x 55.9 cm)
Framed: 18 5/8 × 25 3/8 × 1 1/2 inches (47.3 × 64.5 × 3.8 cm)
Edition of 3, printed 2023
Bob Crawford (1939-2015)
Untitled (Stevie Wonder at FESTAC 1977), 1977
Archival inkjet print on Simply Elegant Gold Fibre paper
Image: 8 x 12 inches (20.3 x 30.5 cm)
Sheet: 11 x 14 inches (27.9 x 35.6 cm)
Edition of 3, printed 2023
BOB CRAWFORD (b. 1939-2015)
K. Kofi Moyo (1939, Chicago, Illinois) is a photojournalist who has published works in Ebony, Chicago Defender, and the Black Photographers Annual documenting notable moments in Black history. Among the artist's extensive archive of street photography and photojournalism is a collection of images that capture a politically, socially, and culturally significant event held in Lagos, Nigeria in 1977: the Second World Black and African Festival of Arts and Culture, known as FESTAC '77.
K. Kofi Moyo (b. 1939)
Buses on Route and Passing National Theater, 1977
Archival inkjet print on Simply Elegant Gold Fibre paper
Image: 13 1/4 x 20 inches (33.7 x 50.8 cm)
Sheet: 17 x 22 inches (43.2 x 55.9 cm)
Framed: 18 5/8 × 25 3/8 × 1 1/2 inches (47.3 × 64.5 × 3.8 cm)
Edition of 1, printed 2023
K. Kofi Moyo (b. 1939)
Buses of Delegates Moving to FESTAC Village, 1977
Archival inkjet print on Simply Elegant Gold Fibre paper
Image: 13 1/4 x 20 inches (33.7 x 50.8 cm)
Sheet: 17 x 22 inches (43.2 x 55.9 cm)
Framed: 18 5/8 × 25 3/8 × 1 1/2 inches (47.3 × 64.5 × 3.8 cm)
Edition of 1, printed 2023
Moyo's social justice activism is reflected in his work capturing “real-time” positive images of Black life on the South Side of Chicago. More than a “casual observer”, Kofi Moyo was an active member of The Catalyst Organization, and Institute of Positive Education—both with a mission to implement uplifting educational and societal change for citizens of that community.
K. Kofi Moyo, North American FESTAC Delegation Boarding Plane in Accra, Ghana, 1977
Moyo co-founded Real Men Cook for Charity and published Real Men Cook: Rites, Rituals, and Recipes for Living (Simon and Schuster, 2005) with a foreword by then-United States Senator Barack Obama. Recent solo exhibitions include K. Kofi Moyo and FESTAC ‘77: The Activation of a Black Archive (2021), presented at the Logan Center for the Arts, Chicago.
K. KOFI MOYO (b. 1939)
