Just a stone’s throw from the Canal Saint-Martin and the Goncourt metro station, visitors can now push open the doors of MansA, the new public cultural venue entirely dedicated to African and Afro-descendant worlds. Nestled at 26 rue Jacques-Louvel Tessier, this vast 800 m², three-storey space offers a modern, warm and inclusive setting.
Envisioned as early as 2021 during the Africa-France Summit in Montpellier, MansA is a pilot project designed to run for two years, until a permanent location can be found by 2027. At the helm of this teeming center – Liz Gomis, a Franco-Senegalese journalist and filmmaker, who wants to make it a space that’s “lively, open and accessible to all”.
A lively, free space open to all forms of creation
Funded by the French Ministry of Foreign Affairs and the Ministry of Culture, MansA is not a museum, but an artistic and civic laboratory. Here, contemporary African creation is invited in all its forms – visual arts, cinema, music, debates, entrepreneurship.
Access to the exhibitions is free on reservation, and the public is invited to take part in the experience – by meeting the artists, taking part in discussions or discovering the sound evenings around African and Caribbean music.
For its opening, MansA welcomes the “Noires” exhibition by Roxane Mbanga, a 29-year-old French-Cameroonian and Guadeloupean artist. Between fluorescent wallpapers, tropical landscapes and women’s hands braiding hair, her universe celebrates multiple identities and crossed heritages. Present on-site throughout the exhibition, the artist invites visitors to “share a space of conviviality and repair”.
In terms of programming, MansA promises a dense, cross-disciplinary offering:
- CinéMansA film club, with screenings and debates on cult films such as Freda, Burning an Illusion and A Deusa Negra,
- Concerts and sound evenings featuring Ghanaian highlife, Sahelian rock, Cameroonian makossa and raï ,
- Unprecedented collaboration with the Centre Pompidou to restore films by director Sarah Maldoror ,
- International exchanges with Brazil and Nigeria, and soon, the creation of a pan-African magazine bringing together editors from all over the world.
MansA Lab – an incubator for young Afro-descendant talent and entrepreneurs
MansA also sees itself as a springboard for the next generation. Starting in November, MansA Lab, its incubator dedicated to the cultural and creative industries, will support 12 projects selected for an initial 8-month program .
Through mentoring, training and on-site and online support, the objective is clear – to support Afro-descendant initiatives and weave an international network of artists, creators and entrepreneurs.
A veritable showcase for contemporary African creativity, MansA is part of a dynamic similar to that of the Institut du Monde Arabe, but geared towards a plural Africa. A place that is intellectual, festive and inclusive, where people come to admire and learn as much as to debate and undertake.
📍 MansA – Maison des Mondes Africains – 26, rue Jacques-Louvel Tessier, Paris 10ᵉ
🕒 Tuesday-Thursday: 2pm-7pm / Friday: 2pm-9pm / Saturday: 10am-7pm / Sunday: 11am-7pm
🎟️ Free admission on reservation