Thabo Mbeki Presidential Library - It is an incredible honour and privilege to working on this project, because for me it goes to the heart of the Renaissance that I believe that the continent must start to look at in the 21st century. The opportunity for me when I was asked to look at this project, was more than just to make a container building but it seemed very much that the president and his team were asking, was to imagine a way of using architecture which has always been, the device that is used to define epochs, ages and times; to see if architecture can be marshalled to also make a form that could create a new image of what this particular library seeks to be about.
When, I started looking at this, as with all my work, I am obsessed with the artifacts and research of the African continent. I seek not to do my work, sort of to go into my imagination and draw, but to see if there are lessons from the past that can guide the way we look into the future.
The proposal is to make eight (8), what I call knowledge store that sit on the plinth in this neighborhood. The eight (8) new chambers become the rooms of the program … the auditorium, the great library hall, the women center, the exhibition space, etc. Each one is articulated with the zenitel light that give it a unique atmosphere.
What I was asked to do work, the idea of looking back at the architecture of civilizations, our gatherings and the community of our continent, of course came to my mind. I looked at tombs and palaces. I looked at farm houses, I looked everywhere and I realized that this were specific form and this type of building was something new that required its own articulation.
In the end, what strike me when looking between images of the vernacular architecture, was to notice that in all communities of our continent, the science of the habitation of those communities was the ability to cultivate the land and to live with the land; and the secret of those was the technology as it were sustainable to those communities. The migration that came down from the North Africa to the South. That technologies that was brought with those communities and also subsequently generations the migration made this great country.
So, in a way for me it seemed like that the answer was staring right in front of me, but it was not what I thought it was. The answer seems to be that, we were talking about creating another store, another space of knowledge. That the knowledge, this time is not a graining store where you keep the seed for the future generation that sustain them and nourishes them and allows them to continue; but a different seed, a seed of the knowledge of the works of the great liberations, of movements, of the great work of His Excellency Thabo Mbeki.
Once the idea became clear, it felt like the building unfolded itself. The beautiful program of the building encompasses the study, to gather, to debate, to have libraries, to have in-depth research, to have exhibitions spaces, to have a place just to come to reality to eat, rest and reflect. To have a space that have the ability to have a performance but also a serious place where the study, archiving and the maintenance of this document is also kept.
Duka la maarifa - A knowledge store to inspire and reference Africa
The Thabo Mbeki centre presents an opportunity to realize the ambition of the dreams of President Thabo Mbeki to advance and empower an African Renaissance. The architecture of the library taps into the collective memory of the continent through the establishment of a new historical center for African consciousness in which knowledge, education, and sustenance are nurtured in the representation and intelligence of the continent.
David Adjaye, founder and principal of adjaye associates
My vision for the new presidential library aims to encompass both an African past and an African future. It will be a place where Africans uncover their own history and identity. A place where we are empowered to script a brighter and more prosperous future. Through this wonderful collaboration with Sir David Adjaye and his team, I believe this building will become the epicentre for an African renaissance — a place of pride, celebration and future- forward thinking in which a strong sense of the African identity is empowered for further leadership in service to humanity. - President Thabo Mbeki
The Thabo Mbeki Presidential Project and The Adjaye Associates teach us the practicality of Sankofa, the importance of learning from the past to build the future. Africans as we invent new imaginative geographies, and as we build new civilizations, cities, etc let us be inspired the Akan Tribe of Ghana when they say … "Se wo were fi na wosan kofa a yenkyiri," meaning, "It is not taboo to go back for what you forgot (or left behind)." What is your thought?
