For the refusal of unpayable debts: an artists’ roundtable with Dele Adeyemo, Ahmed Isamaldin, Bahar Noorizadeh, and Gary Zhexi Zhang

Abstract

ABSTRACT In this roundtable, four contemporary artists reflect on the way their practices intersect the theme of the refusal of unpayable debt. Topics include: resistance to the punitive debts imposed on “developing” countries, with a focus on Sudan; financial speculation on the future of urban youth in Nigeria; the role of the weird in a critique of dominant modes of financialization; and the politics that accrue in the abeyance between debts and their impossible reconciliation. The encounter was initially staged as a conversation as part of the 2022 transmediale festival symposium on the theme “For Refusal.”