Tupoka Ogette & Stephen Lawson
The BGHRA in Africana Studies at Rutgers University-Camden and the German Department at Davidson College are pleased to invite you to A Virtual Conversation with Tupoka Ogette & Stephen Lawson, on July 3, 2023 at 12 pm EST. The event is free and open to the public. REGISTER HERE
Tupoka Ogette is an important voice internationally, and especially in the German-speaking world, for highlighting systemic racism and its impact on Black people and People of Color in German speaking Countries. In Germany, Austria, and Switzerland, she is currently the best-known facilitator of critiques of racism. Both her book “exit RACISM. Learning to Think Critically of Racism” as well as her book “Und Jetzt Du. Rassismuskritisch leben.” are SPIEGEL bestsellers.
She works in a team with her husband Stephen Lawson and advises corporations, institutions and political parties. Among others, they work for Disney+, Netflix or Paramount. Tupoka Ogette has spoken at United Nations and at Oxford University. In 2023, she addressed all the world’s foreign offices in a virtual event.
Her books and concepts are considered standard works in schools and universities. In 2019, Ogette was named one of the 25 most influential women of the year by Edition F magazine. SPIEGEL Online included her as one of ten women in its educational canon on theory and politics. In 2021, she was named “Idol of The Year” by About You. In 2023, she received the prestigious Swiss Emilie – Jäger – Award for individuals who have championed gender equality policies in the context of science, university and education in a special way.
Presently Tupoka and Stephen work, create and travel together. Stephen is exploring new forms of artistic and creative expression.This is their website:
www.tupoka.de
Stephen Lawson is a sculptor who is known for his beautifully empowering and reflecting sculptures.Born 1968 in England and growing up in Germany since 1970 he noticed the lack of representation and also the misrepresentation of Black people. So he created a body of work that he refers to as „commissions by his ancestors“, which he keeps in his private collection in order to exhibit and show at fitting occasions. To this day he continues to use the imagery of his sculptures to manifest the beauty and dignity of Black people.
He was trained as a stone mason in Berlin, worked in Paris for a year restoring sculptures on the facade of the Louvre. In the mid 1990’s he settled in the country site in Westphalia to create his own artistic body of work.He participated in many solo and group exhibitions and also performed at various cultural festivals working on sculptures in front of people in order to share the process of creation with people.At the same time a vast amount of private and public commissions all around Germany kept him occupied for a long period until in 2016 he married and joined his wife Tupoka Ogette in her ground breaking and successful work in teaching white people about racism.