MBODJ (ES)

“If it doesn’t exist, make it yourself”. Senegalese-Spanish artist Maguette Dieng embodies this

ideal. Based in Barcelona, she DJs and produces as MBODJ (pronounced em-bodge), but also

curates, educates, and promotes both solo and with Jokkoo, the afro-diasporic collective she

co-founded in 2017.

Championing artists from Africa and the African diaspora alongside leftfield sonics from around

the world, her sets embrace fragility, complexity and the tension of transitions: from gqom and

jungle and footwork to noise.

Although she’s played everywhere from Mutek and Sónar to Boiler Room and Nyege Nyege in

Uganda, her most crucial contributions have been local. With Jokkoo, she’s created critical

alternative spaces for underground culture in the city, bringing radical artists from around the

world to Barcelona and providing a place for local artists to develop, whilst also linking local

actions with global issues from Palestine to Sudan.