made of clay and a warm breath

Kihwa-Endale

7–24.3.2024

Opening of the exhibition: Wednesday 6 March, 18–21


“the act of remembering is to defy and transcend Time and geography, to search for the perfect democracy, since no dictator, censor, law or prison can prevent you entering this paradise”
       -  H.I.E. Dhlomo, South African writer and playwright


These paintings are a documentation of environments when I am in Ethiopia and the daydreams that appear when I am not there.
It is a story about a body that is both home, and the longing for it; about how the longing becomes a world of its own - a paradise.


There is a piece of Abyssinia in this space.
In a place I am learning to call home, the soil dries in the heat of the sun.
I take this clay to another place I am learning to call home and turn it into a paint, blowing onto it with a warm breath until it is a land again.


I was and still am inspired by the serpent of Eden;
also by creation and change; seraphins and saints,
the study of stars and folklore; love stories and times of war
inheritance, migration
separation, connection
becoming and unbecoming