Despite the decades passed since the end of colonial rule, when one dissects and digs into the many layers of what constitutes a country’s present fabric, they are led to forgotten vestiges of colonialism silently at play. It is equally amusing how new and often undocumented facets of 'developments' associated with the colonial era reveal themselves each time some choose to look back and assay. Said narratives, even to this date, are spoken about largely through a European lens—an outcome of centuries worth of systemic stifling and erasure of the voices of the colonised. Looking back at—and on the other side of—history becomes a requisite to platform these ostracised voices, for they wielded the tools of colonialism to wage a crusade for freedom and empowerment. Perhaps it is there that we find answers for the future.

The stricture of colonial powers and the ripples from anti-colonial waves impact much more than a nation’s political landscape. They cascade into everyday life—from conversations and notions to art and architecture. At the 18th Venice Architecture Biennale this year, V&A partners with Architectural Association (AA), London, and Kwame Nkrumah University of Science and Technology (KNUST), Kumasi, to stage the tale of decolonisation through an architectural lens. Their architecture exhibition critically reflects on the imperial roots of tropical modernism by analysing the work of the Department of Tropical Architecture and 14 key projects. From its origin as a tool to buttress colonial rule to symbolising the possibilities of a Pan-African future when adapted by new African nations, Tropical Modernism: Architecture and Power in West Africa discerns the distinctive style’s nuanced timeline. “It has been really important to involve people working and practising in Ghana as part of this project, because this story is often told through a European lens, sometimes negating the contributions of African architects and historians to capturing and talking about this history,” Nana Biamah-Ofosu, researcher and architect at the AA and co-curator of the presentation, says in a conversation with STIR. “We wanted to make sure that this exhibition was a chance to really centre and celebrate those African voices who are often left out of the archives,” she adds.

Curated by Dr Christopher Turner (V&A), Nana Biamah-Ofosu and Bushra Mohamed (AA), the immersive exhibition in the Applied Art Pavillion unfolds around a 35 metres long brise soleil installation and multi-channel film featuring interviews with protagonists, experts and footage of remaining buildings. Embodying the theme of the architecture festival—The Laboratory of the Future—conceived by Director Lesley Lokko, the show prefaces a larger exhibition scheduled to take place at the V&A in London in 2024. Tropical Modernism: Architecture and Power in West Africa is on view from May 20 to November 26, 2023. Speaking about their project, Dr Christopher Turner, Keeper of Art, Architecture, Photography & Design at V&A and lead curator of the exhibition, says, “It considers the power of architecture, both as a means of colonial suppression and a symbol of nascent political freedom, as well as exploring the specific legacy of Tropical Modernism in West Africa.”

1940s: birth of the African experiment

Tropical modernism is an architectural language that infused climate-responsive and vernacular elements of the tropics into an international modernist aesthetic. The semantics of the style were developed by husband and wife architectural duo Maxwell Fry and Jane Drew in the late 1940s and in the context of British West Africa. A scientifically informed layer of climate control was added to the practice of architecture through the introduction of elements such as adjustable louvres, wide eaves and brise soleils that made only superficial reference to the locality. These tenets were propagated through the Department of Tropical Architecture at the AA, where Fry was the programme’s first director—training European architects to work in the colonies. “People in these tropical countries have been designing with climate in mind for centuries and millennia,” Bushra Mohamed, researcher and architect at the AA and co-curator of the presentation, tells STIR. “What Maxwell Fry and Jane Drew did is modernise it—use contemporary materials and modern techniques to make it bigger and long-lasting,” she adds.

The architectural innovations continued to advance against a backdrop of decolonial struggles, soon to emerge triumphant. The region morphed into a laboratory for colonial architects, yielding numerous schools, universities, communities and libraries. This methodology, catering primarily to the comfort of colonial administrators and the creation of an ideal colonial subject, clandestinely aspired to render calls for independence abeyant—paid for by the Colonial Welfare and Development Act’s £200m post-war programme to reform and modernise the colonies. “British colonial architects were able to build in the postwar period in West Africa because there was a 200 million pound program funded by the Commonwealth Welfare and Development Act—equivalent to six billion today. So West Africa became a playground, a laboratory for these colonial architects who could build at that scale with ambition and without the regulations that they would have had at home,” Turner explains in a conversation with STIR.

Colonial architecture as a beacon of freedom

Despite Britain’s rather cynical investments, the ‘winds of change’ buffeted across the African continent. In 1957, Ghana was the first country south of the Sahara to gain independence, followed by two-thirds of the continent becoming free from colonial shackles over the next decade. Kwame Nkrumah, independent Ghana's First Prime Minister and President, saw in Tropical Modernism the possibilities not only for nation-building but an expression of Pan-African ideologies. He commissioned architects from Eastern Europe to work in cahoots with Ghanaian architects to realise structures emblematic of free Africa. “This colonial imposition became a symbol of African independence, of African unity, of Africa being a technologically advanced continent, and also one that rightly had its place in the world's future,” shares Biamah-Ofosu.

The Department of Tropical Studies was invited to join forces with KNUST in 1963—where a first generation of qualified African architects including John Owusu-Addo and African American émigrés to Ghana like J. Max Bond Jr. also taught. This collaboration augmented Nkrumah’s appeals to the African diaspora to return to and help rebuild their homeland. In lieu of positioning traditional African architecture as obsolete or inferior—akin to many colonial assumptions—the School nurtured a refreshing approach of appreciation of vernacular forms and strived towards contriving a unique African style. “The exhibition has also been an important moment to reflect on the legacy of Tropical Modernism as colonial architecture brought to West Africa by the British colonial government. These buildings now have a significant place in our context, in our built environment. And it is really important that we are able to reflect on what it means to have this colonial legacy within our cities,” Biamah-Ofosu tells STIR.

Remembering the ‘Bauhaus of the tropics’

For their presentation in Venice, the V&A assayed the archives to celebrate key roles that were overlooked. The exhibition being a collaborative act was of utmost importance. “It is an investigation of the V&A's collection of RIBA archives which feature a lot of Maxwell Fry and Jane Drew's work, the Architectural Association’s archives, which record the history of the Department of Tropical Architecture, and also KNUST's really amazing and rich archive of the projects that were built on its campus during the mid-60s,” the curators state. 

The curators used the elongated plan of the Pavillion of Applied Arts to construct a 35m-long brise soleil wall installation drawing from Fry and Drew’s works. The apertures house embedded lightboxes and vitrines showcasing photographs, plans and other relics speaking of Tropical Modernism. An immersive three-channel film shot in Ghana that features panoramic portraits of 14 key remaining buildings including a Community Centre in Accra by Fry and Drew and Unity Hall at KNUST in Kumasi by John Owusu-Addo awaits the viewers at the centre of the Pavilion. Interviews with surviving protagonists such as 94-year-old architect Owusu-Addo and Samia Nkrumah, are interspersed with archival footage showing the buildings as they were first used and situating the architecture in the politics of the time. “These buildings have survived. It is really important to celebrate how architecture was used by groups of Pan-African leaders at the height of independence,” states Biamah-Ofosu.

Elucidating how the components of tropical modernism have pervaded historical architecture in Africa, Mohamed says, "There are artefacts that you can see in the historical architecture found in West Africa. Things like the screen walls of the Ashanti shrine houses or other techniques of using perforated screens to allow the wind to pass through buildings, buildings with earth, timber and wattle and daub to keep the heat in and cool the buildings at night—all those principles were already being used." The decline of tropical modernism came along with the military coup in Ghana in 1966—its principles of climate control were replaced by glass buildings equipped with air conditioning. Yet, in a time when the globe faces an unnerving climate crisis, Tropical Modernism: Architecture and Power in West Africa nudges the viewers to contemplate: can the scientifically evolved principles of tropical modernism be reconsidered? And can structures that live as their last testimonials be revived and preserved?

STIR heralds Venice Architecture Biennale 2023’s zealous crusade for an inclusive, equitable and sustainable future! Explore 'The Laboratory of the Future' and the expositions hosted across various national pavilions—Ireland, Ukraine, Canada, Denmark and more—with our exclusive interviews, visits, and analyses.