Diasporic Life: Black Solidarity/Towards Liberation Opening

Join us for the opening of Diasporic Life: Black Solidarity/Towards Liberation Opening on Friday, June 5th 2026, from 6pm at Metro54, Westerdoksdijk 597, Amsterdam.

Diasporic Life: Black Solidarity/Towards Liberation unfolds as the second chapter of Diasporic Life. It builds on the earlier manifestation Diasporic Life: Black Togetherness as a Lingua Franca, developed with Barby Asante between London and Amsterdam. The project continues a multi-year international and interdisciplinary research process that considers the meaning, multiplicity and complexity of Black aliveness in Fortress Europe, in relation to the African continent and its many Diasporas. Diasporic Life centers the Black imaginative world and the ways it enchants everyday Black diasporic life beyond the shadow of anti-Black violence. How do “we” keep each other alive? In what ways does Diasporic Life manifest itself in visual and sonic cultures Black people make for themselves for each other? And what methodologies, dreams and processes (re)shape the practices and daily lives of Black artists, activists and cultural producers?

Alongside the Diasporic Life manifestation, Metro54 presents: Internet Is a Real Place, collaborated with Eben Badu; an interactive installation designed as a hybrid between an old-school internet café, a DIY radio booth, and a contemporary streaming (bed)room. The ground floor space will be activated for live and digital performances, listening sessions and DJ sets.

For Black diasporic communities, the internet is not an abstraction: it is a Real Place in which culture is continuously produced, shared, and contested. Since the opening of Internet cafés in the 90s, digital spaces have become extensions and archives of everyday life — carving space for language, humor, music, dance, gossip, history and aesthetics to circulate. Most contemporary internet culture originates from the works of Black creatives, yet ownership, capital and credit are still co-opted by Whiteness.

Join us for a myriad of programs which explore the Internet as a Real Place, questioning digital subcultures, streaming, artificial intelligence and the fervour of Black solidarity in both physical and online spaces.

🔥Date: Friday 5th June
🔥Time: 18:00 - 21:00
🔥Location: Westerdoksdijk 597,
🔥Please RSVP, Free

We hope to see you at our space, on Friday 6th June at 6pm