Everyone has an idea about "Africa." Pestilence, famine and genocide top many people's lists. Others think of boundless natural wonder and sprawling metropolises bursting with life. But the truth of it is, there is no one "Africa." There are only Africans, and they defy generalization.

"It is impossible to comprehend fully what Africa is. Like placing a bet that cannot be won," writes chief curator Simon Njami of "Africa Remix," the largest exhibition of contemporary African art ever assembled, which opens in Tokyo on Saturday at the Mori Art Museum in Roppongi Hills.

Njami has traveled widely throughout Africa for two decades as an essayist, novelist, senior curator of the Bamamko Photography Festival in Mali and editor of La Revue Noir, a prominent journal of contemporary African art and literature. For "Africa Remix" he has brought together the painting, photography, sculpture, video and installations of 84 contemporary artists from all over Africa, offering a compelling look at the deep veins of creativity that crisscross the continent.

In recent years, the emergence of a handful of acclaimed and widely exhibited African artists has done much to expand general interest in contemporary art from the region. Still, despite the renown of Cheri Samba, Bodys Isek Kingelez, William Kentridge and Samuel Fosso, all of whom are featured in "Africa Remix," the exhibition's organizers are careful to point out that ill-informed preconceptions about contemporary African society and culture remain deeply entrenched.

"You could ask, 'Who needs another African show? We've got beyond that,' " said David Elliott, director of the Mori Art Museum and originator of the idea for the exhibition. "But the fact is that we haven't got beyond that. The African shows to date, rather than being very partial, have been so heavily loaded with regards to their view of 'Africanity' they have been almost pernicious."

A lot has changed since 1989 when a show like the groundbreaking and controversial exhibition "Magiciens de la Terre" drew crowds to the Centre Pompidou in Paris by boasting the postcolonial wonders of newly independent, non-Western "magic makers" -- a notion that was, despite the show's success, condescending to some. While "Magiciens" was hugely important in introducing the world to a new generation of creators, "Africa Remix" comes at a time when African artists need not be considered magicians in order to be taken seriously.

Marie-Laure Bernadac, co-curator of "Africa Remix" with Njami when it was shown at the Centre Pompidou last summer, told an interviewer: " 'Magiciens de la Terre' was the first exposition of its type . . . 'Africa Remix' would like to be the last."
An Africa voice

If the show's reception in Dusseldorf, London and Paris, before its arrival in Tokyo, was any indication, African artists are not only striking out in new directions, they are demanding new audiences and finding them.

"The problem for Africa is that up to now it has not been able to build its own language," Njami told The Japan Times during a recent interview in Tokyo. "Whatever is said about Africa is said outside of Africa. So nobody hears actual African voices. Just go to the library and look at the African section. You'll find 99 percent of the books are made outside Africa by some so-called specialist."

"Africa Remix" is meant to help correct that, and is the first major international exhibition of contemporary African art to be curated by an African. That label, however, is complicated. Njami was born in Switzerland to Cameroonian parents. Similarly, while all the artists included in the exhibition have a connection with Africa, the nature of their connections vary widely. Some live and work in Africa, others travel frequently or live part of each year outside of the continent, and still others are full-fledged members of the diaspora. Photographer and video artist Lara Baladi, for instance, was born in Lebanon but has lived and worked in Cairo for a decade, and is included in the show as an Egyptian artist, while Painter Zoulikha Bouabdellah was born in Moscow to Algerian parents and lives in France.

"All of the artists in 'Africa Remix' have a link with Africa," said Njami, "but I also wanted to show that there is not one 'African identity.' Such a concept is just a metaphor, a dream. Part of the aim of 'Africa Remix' is just to show people that you can't know 'Africa.'

"I always see my shows as works in progress, raising questions, and forcing people to address issues. I would like people to come to 'Africa Remix' with their ideas, and come out without any ideas, completely confused."

While the show was popular in Europe, it has sparked heated discussions wherever it has gone, and a handful of reviewers have taken issue with the confusion Njami seeks to inspire, balking at his eclectic selection, and arguing that the attempt to offer a summary of an entire continent's creative activity is an impossible enterprise that lacks focus and consistency.

"Africa resists this kind of exhibition," wrote Jonathan Jones in the London-based Independent newspaper after the show's opening at the Hayward Gallery in London last February, "because it is one vast and terrible reminder that life and death are more real than art."

Njami has no patience with such sentiments.

"It is as if art was not part of Africa, as if Africans could not do art. If you're starving, you should not go to see a movie? You don't deserve it? No, this is completely stupid," he responded. "People who are looking at African art are often only looking at a mirror of their own fantasies, because if they don't have a clue about the continent and its people, what else can they see?"

Art of life

Ultimately, the works included in the show call out to be considered on their individual artistic merits, not only as parts of a general creative phenomenon ascribed to an immense continent. Wanegechi Mutu creates intricate and joyful collages tinged with the whisper of violence. Pascale Marthine Tayou's photographs of an anonymous West African rural landscape reveal a world where trees, grass, signs and homes are all but swallowed by a sea of red clay earth. Richard Onyango's paintings depict the bizarre sexual relationship of a gargantuan white woman and a lithe black man set amid lush savanna and mountain landscapes. Romuald Hazoume re-imagines the African mask with a mountain of used jerry cans.

If one is able to speak generally, it might be said that there is a lack of pretentiousness in these works, a tendency to approach difficult subjects without resorting to holier-than-thou moralizing, and qualities of directness, silence, observation and reflection that are deeply affecting. Far from faltering in the face of the everyday struggle for survival that many Africans must face, the artists included in "Africa Remix" represent and reflect on the life The Independent's Jones claims defies them with relish and panache.

"What I am saying quite often about African artists is that there is no way they cannot deal with life," said Njami. "They are surrounded by life, and the artists are filled with that life. They are not into some post-post-post questioning . . . That is why I think the future is in Africa and the other regions outside the West. Because their art is not about empty vessels or fake ideas or newness -- it is about life."
Continental crossroads

Njami's task has not only been to educate Western, and now Japanese, audiences about the quality and diversity of African contemporary art. Because of political, economic and cultural realties, he struggles to confront the preconceptions and ignorance of some of the artists themselves. In this respect, the exhibition has served as a small but important meeting place for creators from a continent where it is often easier to travel to Europe, the United States or the Middle East than to fly to a neighboring country.

"One thing I discovered a few years ago is that because of my work I probably know Africa better than most Africans living there," Njami said. ". . . 'Africa Remix' allows artists to discover each other, and discover some brotherhood they didn't think of before."

Within Africa there are few venues that encourage artists from across the continent, and the larger diaspora, to gather and discuss themes, ideas, synergies and trends. Njami's Revue Noir magazine has served as a forum, and several regular art events have emerged in African countries. Still, the Johannesburg Biennale in South Africa and the Alexandria Biennale in Egypt have had limited success in addressing the contemporary art scene of Africa as a whole due, in part, to a lack of necessary resources.

According to Elliott from the Mori, the wait for an Africa-based, truly continent-wide art forum may be over, though, as the Luanda Triennale inaugurated on May 12 in Angola appears to have the backing and ambitious agenda required for the establishment of a permanent means for the further regional development and exhibition of contemporary art.
A new conversation

What lasting effect "Africa Remix" will have remains to be seen. Until more travelers make their way to Africa not only to visit game parks and nature reserves, but to immerse themselves in cultures, cities and conversations, it will be hard to dissolve preconceptions and ignorance about the continent. And until African artists reap the benefits of better infrastructure and more stable politics, they will continue to struggle to connect with their contemporaries on even the most fundamental levels.

But what seems certain is that the air has cleared somewhat, and a new conversation has begun in earnest. "Africa Remix" rejects the common notion of Africa as a mere victim of calamity, in need only of saving. In the end, it rejects the notion of "Africa" at all, except as a geographic reality, or, as Njami says, "a metaphor, a dream." Instead, the show presents a mere suggestion of life as it is lived on the continent, but one that is profound in its depth and diversity. "Africa Remix" might be the last exhibition of its kind, but African contemporary art is here to stay. The world best pay attention.

"Africa Remix: Contemporary Art of a Continent" is at the Mori Art Museum, Roppongi Hills till August 31. Read the interview with the curator of "Africa Remix"