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Paper short abstract

This presentation looks reflexively back at a shared experience of fieldwork on relations to plants in Ìbàdàn (Nigeria) between Nigerian photographer Ọbáyọmí A. Anthony, French visual artists D. and E. Chevalme and French anthropologist E. Guitard, that led us to an exhibition in 2024 in Nigeria.

Paper long abstract

This presentation offers a reflexive return at a shared experience of fieldwork (« enquête-création », Nova 2021, see also Bationo-Tillon & al. 2024) between Nigerian photographer Ọbáyọmí A. Anthony, French visual artists Delphine & Elodie Chevalme and French anthropologist Emilie Guitard on relations to plants in Ìbàdàn, southwestern Nigeria.

From 2017, as part of the Treebadan research program, then from 2022 within the INFRAPATRI program bringing together researchers (in social sciences and botany) and artists to apprehend attachments to plants in 4 sub-Saharan African cities as an “infra-heritage”, I invited Delphine and Elodie Chevalme and Ọbáyọmí A. Anthony to share my ethnographic fieldwork, at the foot of isolated trees and in the wooded areas of Ìbàdàn. The aim was to combine the classic tools of ethnography (observation, informal exchanges, interviews, ethnoscience methodology) with artistic methods such as in situ drawing and night and documentary photography, to jointly produce "sensitive knowledge" on the daily interactions of Ìbàdàn's city dwellers with plants, and to capture their role in the production of urban atmospheres specific to the city. This long-term collaboration led us to produce and curate jointly a collective exhibition, « Igi’bàdàn. Living With Trees in Ìbàdàn », presented in 2024 at the Alliance Française in Lagos and the University of Ìbàdàn, in Nigeria.

This presentation will take a reflexive look back at these moments of shared fieldwork between French and Nigerian researcher and artists, as well as at the implementation of the exhibition presenting the results of this collaboration.