23 by seminars, student walkabouts, public performances, a major Art Africa feature and extensive media coverage, the exhibition attracted wide public engagement while positioning VIAD, FADA and UJ as important contributors to global art-science discourse from an African perspective. VIAD’s Radical | Others (R | O) stream continued to function as an experimental platform for critical discourse, artistic collaboration and speculative research focused on radical feminisms, digitalities, mobilities and planetarities. Throughout 2025, R | O deepened its global orientation through partnerships with institutions such as Brown University, the Africa Institute (Global Studies University), GALA Queer Archive and international scholars, artists and activists. A key component of the stream’s work was its seminar and public engagement programme. The student-led Visual Arts–VIAD seminar platform hosted 17 seminars during the year, exposing students and emerging practitioners to debates around cultural production, politics, technology and professional practice. The programme also strengthened student leadership through dedicated seminar committees focused on research, documentation, hospitality and social media engagement. R | O also continued to develop postgraduate and interdisciplinary dialogue through seminars held in partnership with the SARChI Chair in South African Art and Visual Culture. These engagements created an important platform for practice-led research discussions among postgraduate students, artists and researchers associated with VIAD. The stream’s internship programme provided practical research and curatorial experience for postgraduate students, most notably through the work of Keonah Nyembe, whose contributions ranged from research assistance to exhibition facilitation within BA+DA’s Re:Fuse-Ability exhibition. Among the most significant long-term projects within R | O was the Imagined New (or, what happens when History is a Catastrophe?), developed in collaboration with Brown University and the Africa Institute. The project examined contemporary violence, authoritarianism and “death-worlds” through interdisciplinary workshops, thought dialogues, publications and future artist residencies and exhibitions. The 2025 phases brought together scholars, artists and activists from Africa and the diaspora to interrogate questions of war, catastrophe and alternative futures. R | O also expanded its engagement with queer African discourse through its ongoing collaboration with GALA Queer Archive under the initiative To be queer and African. Through public events, panel discussions and online roundtables, the project explored questions of identity, migration, climate justice and community-building within African and Afrodiasporic contexts, while also contributing to broader Sustainable Development Goal priorities relating to inclusion, justice and equality. The stream hosted a wide range of additional public lectures, screenings, workshops and discussions during the year, featuring internationally recognised scholars and practitioners such as Ariella Aïsha Azoulay, Anthony Bogues, TJ Demos, Nolan Oswald Dennis and Russel Hlongwane. These engagements addressed themes including decolonial digital futures, ecological violence, Black technopoetics, migration, war, justice and the afterlives of colonialism. Several of these initiatives also generated forthcoming publications, collaborative projects and future international symposia. Collectively, the activities of BA+DA and Radical | Others in 2025 strengthened VIAD’s role as a major centre for interdisciplinary artistic research, experimental knowledge production and socially engaged scholarship. Through exhibitions, seminars, publications, residencies, performances and international partnerships, the Centre continued to position FADA and the University of Johannesburg at the forefront of critical art, design and humanities research both locally and globally.
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