Also launching this year is the festival’s annual print journal, Márọkọ́. Named after the thriving migrant community east of the Lagos Lagoon.
By Editor
The Lagos International Poetry Festival (LIPFest) is set to hold this year from October 27th – October 31st 2022.
LIPFest 2022 centers the mother-tongue and the ongoing reclamation of default languages from the rubble of colonialism. It draws an array of guest poets, writers, translators, and performers, as they translate their experiences by taking us beneath the skin of their tongues.
Events will include special performance showcases with offerings from Ghana, Kenya, South Africa, Nigeria, India, Germany, Spain, the US, Scotland, England, and Belgium. Workshops and masterclasses will connect poets and writers at different stages of their careers for career shaping craft sessions, and the festival’s keynote conversations and panels will unpack the theme.
This year’s festival will see a return of all of the festival’s signature events including multi-venue poetry, spoken word, and music performances, edgy conversations on the urgent issues of the day, book launches and readings, a poetry slam and fun evenings of music, dance and camaraderie.
Also launching this year is the festival’s annual print journal, Márọkọ́. Named after the thriving migrant community east of the Lagos Lagoon, who were violently evicted in the early 90s to make way for one of the most expensive real estate strips in the world, a garish urban sprawl built on the debris of over 300,000 scattered dreams, Márọkọ́ draws its ethos from the unbowed spirits that relentlessly confront the reckless possibilities of Lagos.
It renders the rough hewn beauties and joys that connect pan-African and pan-diasporic experiences, in poetry, prose and photography, tracing a contemporary canon across the contours of contemporary black urban life.
This year’s edition of LIPFest holds at Terra Kulture: Plot 1376, Tiamiyu Savage Street, Victoria Island, Lagos.