Emeka Ogboh | In-conversation

Speakers: Emeka Ogboh, Tessa Giblin, Dr Bonaventure Soh Bejeng Ndikung, Morag J Grant and Dr. Katharina von Ruckteschell-Katte.

Presented in partnership with Goethe Institute Glasgow.

This online conversation presents a unique opportunity to hear Emeka Ogboh discuss the themes of his Edinburgh Art Festival commission, Song of the Union, with Tessa Giblin, Director of Talbot Rice Gallery and the project’s curator, and related experts, including the Founder and Artistic Director of Savvy Contemporary and curator of Sonsbeek 2020, Dr. Bonaventure Soh Bejeng Ndikung, and the musicologist Morag J Grant. With an introduction by Dr. Katharina von Ruckteschell-Katte, Director Goethe-Institut London. 

Emeka Ogboh’s newly commissioned sound installation, Song of the Union, is sited in Edinburgh’s Burns Monument, and responds to the ongoing theatre surrounding the UK’s departure from the European Union.  

Song of the Union features the recorded voices of citizens from each nation state of the European Union, singing in their mother tongue, ‘Auld Lang Syne’ – a song attributed to the poet Robert Burns (1759-96) and which has come to represent solidarity, friendship and open doors. The resulting polyphonic choir affects a complex interweaving of language, syntax, cadence and rhythm.  

The internationally recognised song of farewell was sung in the European Parliament on the 29 January 2020, marking the moment of Britain’s final withdrawal from the European Union. 

This online panel discussion draws out some of the wider political and historical contexts informing Song of the Union.