A series of studies related to the impact of international grants on culture in Africa centered around the Dakar Biennale of contemporary African art regularly followed since 1998. The research has highlight the role played by “projects” in shaping the art system and influencing its discourse. Further research has highlighted the ambiguity in framing and evaluating culture in developing dynamics.

Selection of Outputs:

• Pensa, Iolanda. System Error. We Would Have Never Thought: Contemporary Art as a System Error in Contemporary perspectives in art and international development, eds. Polly Stupples and Katerina Teaiwa, Routledge, series Routledge Studies in Culture and Development, 2017.
• Pensa, Iolanda. I’ll have a project. How international grants and cultural cooperation have shaped contemporary African art into a project made of objectives, activities and expected results in “Seismopolite Journal of Art and Politics”, 2013.
• Ph.D. thesis La Biennale de Dakar comme projet de coopération et de développement (directors Jean-Loup Amselle EHESS Ecole des Hautes Etudes en Sciences Sociales, Parigi and Prof. Rosanna Salerno (Politecnico di Milano, Paris, 2011).