After the Millennium: Contemporary Ethiopian Architecture

Royal Netherlands Embassy in Ethiopia by architects Dick van Gameren and Bjarne Mastenbroek, 2007

Ethiopia today exemplifies the realities of life in contemporary Africa. It is a country of dynamic growth, rapid cultural transformation, and increasing engagement with the world that reflects the country’s historically cosmopolitan nature.

Yet it is also a country facing the reality of a civil war that threatens to dissolve the country into ethnic regions. Ethiopia – like the United States and countries around the world – is struggling with multiple threats to liberal democracy alongside epochal crises of public health, income inequality, and climate change.

This exhibit was initially conceived in 2016 to document the prior fifteen years of positive developments in Ethiopia as it emerged as one of the world’s five fastest-growing economies. Ethiopia enjoyed advancements in growing political freedom, improved health of its population, and social stability.

In the past months, challenges to Ethiopia’s underlying political instability have revealed the country’s fault lines. We hope that this exhibit can still be appreciated to show what gains have been made since 2000 – and to demonstrate a vision of civic architecture that holds the promise of a united Ethiopia.

This exhibit was co-curated by David Rifkind (BAC alumnus and Director, School of Architecture, University of Florida) and Dawit Benti (Prospace in Addis Ababa).

This exhibit is supported generously by funding from the Shafran Haimes Foundation, from alumnus, James Vaseff, and the Georgia Power Foundation, and from alumna, Robin Kneeland-Willcox.

The exhibit was on display in the McCormick Gallery at the BAC from November 2021 to April 2022.