Ussumane Tchuda

Ussumane Tchuda is a PhD candidate at the African Studies Centre Leiden (ASCL) and ISCTE-IUL, interested in the intersection of art, spirituality and political mobilisation in Africa. With professional experience in arts administration, exhibition logistics and archival research at institutions including the British Council, Heatherwick Studio and the V&A, he holds a Master’s degree in Museum Cultures from Birkbeck, University of London, and a Bachelor's degree in Japanese Studies from SOAS, University of London. His PhD topic inquires into how spiritually charged artistic practices function as infrastructures of political resistance in Senegal and Guinea-Bissau. His master’s thesis focused on the Musée des Civilisations Noires in Dakar, examining its Pan-African foundations, the geopolitical implications of its Chinese funding, and its post-ethnographic approach to curation and restitution.