1 – 31 October 2026
Main Festival Programme: 8–11 October 2026
Mountview and CLF Art Lounge, Peckham, London
African Heritage Festival London is a new annual celebration of African literature, cinema, music, visual art, performance, history and living cultural traditions. Created for audiences in Britain, Africa and across the global diaspora, the Festival brings together artists, writers, filmmakers, scholars, traditional leaders, cultural institutions, families and young people in a dynamic encounter with Africa’s creative inheritance.
More than a showcase, the Festival is a meeting place – between the past and the future, the continent and its diaspora, indigenous languages and international audiences, established cultural figures and new generations of creators.
The inaugural edition places the extraordinary life, imagination and literary legacy of D. O. Fágúnwà at its heart. One of Africa’s pioneering novelists, Fágúnwà transformed Yoruba oral traditions, mythology, philosophy and moral storytelling into a remarkable body of literature whose significance reaches far beyond Nigeria. Through readings, performances, conversations, books, exhibitions, film, visual interpretation and immersive experiences, the Festival will introduce his enchanted literary universe to new audiences.
A central feature of the Festival will be The Fágúnwà Forest – an imaginative environment inspired by the mysterious forests, spiritual encounters, heroic journeys and moral questions that animate Fágúnwà’s novels. Literature will move beyond the printed page through dramatic readings, storytelling, projected imagery, music, performance, comics, illustration and encounters with scholars, translators, members of the Fágúnwà family and contemporary creative artists.
The programme will also explore Fágúnwà’s influence on African literature, the continuing importance of writing in indigenous languages, and the challenges of carrying oral traditions into books, cinema, theatre and new digital forms.
The Festival will open itself to the streets and communities of London through Nigeria in Full Colour, a vibrant public celebration of Nigerian fashion, music, dance, identity and cultural diversity. Traditional and contemporary costumes, percussion, movement and community participation will transform Peckham into a living procession of colour and sound.
This celebration is not simply a display of heritage. It is an invitation to Africans in the diaspora – especially children and younger generations – to experience culture as something alive, joyful, contemporary and personally meaningful.
African cinema and moving-image culture will form another major part of the Festival. Screenings will include feature films, documentaries, cultural productions and specially selected works exploring literature, art, history and African identity. Selected programmes will also be made available through digital screening and streaming, extending the Festival beyond the physical venue to international audiences.
Music will run throughout the Festival, from live African performance and Afrobeat histories to conversations about the musicians, producers and cultural movements that carried African sound across the world. Dance workshops, including a programme led by internationally celebrated dancer and choreographer Peter Badejo, will invite audiences to participate directly in African movement traditions.
The literary programme will include book presentations, readings, signings, exhibitions, interviews, panel discussions and conversations among writers, academics, publishers, translators and cultural custodians. A special archival visit will connect participants with important Fágúnwà materials held at SOAS University of London.
The Festival will also examine the wider worlds surrounding African books: translation, publishing, oral authorship, education, archives, cultural preservation and the responsibility of institutions to make African knowledge accessible to future generations.
A special Festival gala will bring together live music, African cuisine, conversation, fashion and performance. A creative presentation inspired by the beauty and ceremonial richness of a Yoruba traditional wedding will offer audiences an intimate experience of culture through costume, music, ritual, humour and celebration.
Although the first edition is centred on D. O. Fágúnwà, African Heritage Festival London is conceived as an expanding international platform. In future editions, major African writers and cultural traditions will be placed in conversation with authors, storytellers and artistic traditions from other parts of the world.
Through these encounters, the Festival will explore the connections between cultures: the shared power of storytelling, the survival of indigenous languages, the role of memory, and the ways communities preserve identity while responding to a changing world.
African Heritage Festival London invites everyone – African and non-African, young and old, specialist and first-time visitor – to enter a world of stories, images, sounds and ideas.
Come to discover. Come to remember. Come to participate.
