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Betül Sefika: Crops
Eighteen young Flemish and Dutch authors bring an artefact to life from the Slavery exhibition at the Rijksmuseum in Amsterdam. Betül Sefika was inspired for her visual poem by a rice stalk of the Ma Sapi variety, which is directly descended from rice seeds that were smuggled from Africa to Suriname by the enslaved woman Sapali.
Rice stalk Ma Sape/ Sapali, 21st century. The rice variety is descended from rice seeds that possibly ended up in Suriname via a slave ship from Africa. Sapali braided the stalk of rice into her hair when she escaped from a plantation. © Tinde van Andel, Naturalis Biodiversity Center, Leiden, Photo: Marlies Lageweg
Crops
This text was written during a residency at Flemish-Dutch cultural organisation Huis deBuren in association with the Biermans-Lapôtre Foundation.
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