Monumental Diplomacy
99% Invisible6 Sep 2022

Monumental Diplomacy

In downtown Windhoek, Namibia -- at the intersection of Fidel Castro Street and Robert Mugabe Avenue -- there's an imposing gold building with an affectionate nickname: the Coffee Maker. This notable structure was built to commemorate Namibia’s fight for independence from apartheid South Africa, which it achieved in 1990. And for many of the visitors, the museum feels like a huge achievement. But for a museum that commemorates throwing off the chains of colonialism and forging a new era of self-determination, it has one pretty strange feature. It wasn't designed by a Namibian architect. It wasn't even designed by an African architect. It was built by North Korea's state-run design studio, which has long been a prolific maker of statues around the world. North Korea has left a distinct visual stamp across Africa in particular, with museums and monuments erected in more than a dozen African countries since the 1970s.

Monumental Diplomacy

Subscribe to SiriusXM Podcasts+ to listen to new episodes of 99% Invisible ad-free and a whole week early.

Start a free trial now on Apple Podcasts or by visiting siriusxm.com/podcastsplus.


Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.

Avsnitt(782)

Broken Heart Park

Broken Heart Park

In the 1990s Dave Davis worked as the groundskeeper at a small neighborhood park in a suburb of St. Louis called Creve Coeur. It was an unpaid position, but it came with a strange perk: as part of the...

8 Mars 202237min

According to Need wins duPont-Columbia Award

According to Need wins duPont-Columbia Award

The Columbia Journalism School recently announced the 16 winners of the 2022 Alfred I. duPont-Columbia University Awards, including According to Need, a project of 99% Invisible produced by Katie Ming...

1 Mars 202259min

Art Imitates Art

Art Imitates Art

There's a small neighborhood within the SEZ of Shenzhen that is known for mass-producing copies of the most celebrated works of Western art, all painted quickly and by hand. The place is called Dafen ...

22 Feb 202240min

Call of Duty: Free

Call of Duty: Free

On the west coast of Ireland, on the banks of an estuary dividing county Limerick from county Clare, lies a small town called Shannon. But Shannon is not a quaint fishing village or farming community....

16 Feb 202249min

Reaction Offices and the Future of Work

Reaction Offices and the Future of Work

People have been going back and forth about what makes a healthy and productive office since there have been offices. The 20th century was full of misbegotten fads and productivity innovations that co...

9 Feb 202242min

Rock Paper Scissors Bus

Rock Paper Scissors Bus

When the two greatest auction houses in the world – Christie’s and Sotheby’s – vied for the privilege of auctioning off $20 million worth of art in 2004, little did they know that they would be forced...

2 Feb 202231min

The Punisher Skull

The Punisher Skull

The Punisher has always been a complicated Marvel antihero: a man whose creator imagined him as a reaction to the failures of government at home and in the Vietnam War. So why is the Punisher’s tradem...

25 Jan 202239min

Mini-Stories : Volume 14

Mini-Stories : Volume 14

At the end of the calendar year and into the new year the 99pi staff collects a bunch of short, joyful little stories that are fun to produce and make us happy. We call them mini-stories. This is the ...

19 Jan 202235min

Populärt inom Business & ekonomi

framgangspodden
varvet
badfluence
rss-jossan-nina
rss-borsens-finest
rss-svart-marknad
avanzapodden
uppgang-och-fall
svd-tech-brief
rss-dagen-med-di
fill-or-kill
borsmorgon
lastbilspodden
affarsvarlden
rss-inga-dumma-fragor-om-pengar
tabberaset
kapitalet-en-podd-om-ekonomi
bathina-en-podcast
rss-den-nya-ekonomin
bilar-med-sladd