-ode 1.01
"All that you touch, you Change. All that you change, changes you." - Olivia Butler.
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During my residency at Odo Valley in Ghana, I worked on the development of a body of work titled -ode. The work involves gathering clay, in this case from around the valley, processing it, sculpting with it, and then logging the sculptures’ silhouettes on a cyanotype print before returning the them back to the sites where I took the material from.
The title of the work refers both to the notion of an “ode” as a kind of poem devoted to praise as well as the Greek suffix “-ode”, denoting either resemblance, or a path/way. The work thus expresses love, gratitude and reverence for the natural world through its mimicry of it, and in tandem acknowledges the vast source of wisdom to be drawn from its ways.
The work explores what it means to be part of a greater ecosystem, and questions humans efforts to own and control parts of it. It reflects on how interconnected we are, on the tension between fleetingness and beauty, and lastly that you change all that you touch and that all that you change, changes you.
RIKI PIKI TIKI KI RIKI KI TIKI
RIKI PIKI TIKI KI RIKI KI TIKI; 2025
Ceramic sculpture
Dimensions: 32 × 18 × 5.5 cm (Overall)
The work references mundane, everyday elements of ABC Island life and juxtapose these with the game of domino’s elements of resilience and the interplay of luck and personal agency that determines outcomes within it.
Poesia Doloroso
What should a process of digital dematerialization look like when it’s deployed in service of the protection and preservation of cultural heritage; especially when that culture does not have European roots, and in the case of Poesia Doloroso specifically, when that culture is Caribbean?
What is the extent of the agency we have gained now that our cultural heritage can exist in a realm where other humans, natural disasters or climate conditions virtually can not harm it?
