Interview by Boima Tucker

Lamin Fofana is a Sierra Leonean DJ and electronic music producer currently living and working out of Berlin, Germany. He runs the record label Sci-fi & Fantasy, and has a new solo album out on Italian label Hundebiss Records called Brancusi sculpting Beyonce (a vinyl edition will be released in January 2019).

Having moved to the US from Freetown in the late 1990s he is an artist with vast range of experiences that have been shaped by international migration. It’s thus no surprise that mobility has long been a part of his artistic exploration. His previous work, completed while living and working in New York City, referenced contemporary headlines around migration. However, after moving to Europe he’s finding there is a fatigue around reporting about the Mediterranean amongst Europeans. So he’s decided to take a long view on human movement around the world, looking back to the past since as he says, “we’ve all been moving around forever.”

Brancusi sculpting Beyonce is based on a Mike Ladd song from the album Negrophilia, a name itself borrowed from a book that explores the co-optation of African cultural artifacts by 1920s modernist European artists such as Pablo Picasso. Fofana’s interest in this legacy comes from his direct participation in the contemporary European art scene, and also having to navigate a not always comfortable existence as an African living in Germany and traveling throughout the European continent. Recently, I spoke with Fofana about his work and experiences. We covered a number of topics, but this excerpt focuses on the current popularity of African music in Europe. The interview is edited for clarity. (Listen to a longer excerpt of the conversation, along with excerpts from Fofana’s album on the latest episode of INTL BLK Radio.)