january residency nairobi
Syowia Kyambi
Sunday, 21 Jan
SESSION EVALUATION
arrival day
Travel to Untethered Magic in Ongata Rongai (approx 45 mins from Nairobi airport)
19:00 - 21:00
informal dinner
Monday, 22 Jan
SESSION EVALUATION
8:00 - 9:30
collective breakfast
10:00 - 16:00
Day trip to Nairobi city centre with local artists
Includes visit to National Gallery, KICC building
tuesday, 23 Jan
SESSION EVALUATION
10:00 - 12:00
Day trip to local market to buy food for collective meals Guided by Untethered Magic team (ongata rongai town)
12:00 - 14:00
COLLECTIVE COOKING
15:00 - 17:30
exploring the Kenyan Visual Art Scene: A Historical Perspective with SYOWIA KyAMBI
19:00 - 22:00
DINNER AND CONVERSATION WITH INVITED LOCAL ARTISTS
Wednesday, 24 Jan
SESSION EVALUATION
8:00 - 9:30
collective breakfast (eat and chat)
9:30 - 15:00
mfa and phd research presentations with guest reviewers Don handa and neo musangi
9:30 - 10:00 - student presentation no. 01: Sandra becker (phD)
10:05 - 10:35 - student presentation no. 02: Brady Smith (PHD)
10:40 - 11:10 - student presentation no. 03: Sandy carson (Mfa)
11:10 - 11:25 - 15 min break
11:30 - 12:00 - student presentation no. 04: Sara kim (mfa)
12:05 - 12:35 - student presentation no. 05 - britta fluevog (PhD)
12:40 - 13:10 - student presentation no. 06 - Jenny hawkinson (MFA)
13:10 - 14:10 - lunch break
14:15 - 14:45 - Student presentation no. 07 Chukwu Emeka Chikenzeie (PhD)
15:00
free time
Thursday, 25 Jan
SESSION EVALUATION
8:00
COLLECTIVE BREAKFAST for pre-historic site trip
9:00 - 16:00
DAY TRIP TO Olorgesailie pre-historic site with untethered magic staff
or personal day off
friday, 26 Jan
SESSION EVALUATION
9:00 - 10:00
COLLECTIVE BREAKFAST (EAT AND CHAT)
11:00 - 13:00
VISIT TO Contemporary and (C&) for research discussion circles WITH ROSE JEPKORIR KIPTUM: Where does the curatorial begin? (westlands mall)
13:00 - 14:00
lunch
14:30 - 15:00
TRAVEL TO NAIROBI CONTEMPORARY ART INSTITUTE (NCAI)
15:30 - 17:30
visit to the nairobi contemporary art institute (NCAI) for research discussion circles with don handa: Where does the curatorial begin? (NCAI)
saturday, 27 Jan
SESSION EVALUATION
9:00 - 10:30
COLLECTIVE BREAKFAST (EAT AND CHAT)
10:30 - 13:30
WORKSHOP - TIME ACCUMULATES WITH OGUTU MURAYA
13:30 - 15:00
LUNCH
15:00 - 17:30
WORKSHOP - the artist as maker and researcher WITH ONYANGO OKETCH
Sunday, 28 jan
SESSION EVALUATION
10:00 - 13:00
kamene art residency and Kaloki Nyamai studio visit with rosie olang
13:00 - 15:00
free time
16:00 - 18:30
collective cooking
19:00 - 21:00
closing dinner with invited artists and curators
venue partner
Untethered Magic
Untethered Magic, established in 2019, aims to foster dialogue among global south, BIPOC north, and colonial actors in contemporary art. This curatorial project creates safe spaces for experimentation, autonomy, and sustainability while addressing colonialism through critical dialogue and collaborations with other institutions to explore decolonisation's impact on art and life.
Mission: Untethered Magic's efforts aim to provide an alternative to traditional societal structures as well as to facilitate meaningful engagement and exchange between artists and communities from various cultural backgrounds.
Sustainable models and networks: Untethered Magic aims to support contemporary artists with a focus on sustainability. We offer residencies and foster a community that values experimentation and autonomy. In Kenya, we provide an alternative to traditional structures and promote interaction between artists and diverse communities, collaborating on decolonisation in contemporary art.
guests
guest reviewers
Don Handa is a curator living and working in Nairobi. He is interested in initiatives that document and contextualize the practices of artists in and from Eastern Africa using an array of tools and platforms. These include exhibition-making, public programing, writing, and podcasting.
He is currently the curator at NCAI (Nairobi Contemporary Art Institute), a non-profit visual art space dedicated to the growth and preservation of contemporary art in East Africa where he leads the delivery of exhibitions and programs.
Neo Sinoxolo Musangi is an independent researcher and artist, currently based in Kajiado, Kenya. Having pursued studies at the University of the Witwatersrand, Johannesburg, Musangi brings a unique blend of academic insight and artistic expression to their diverse body of work. Previously, they contributed to the intellectual landscape while working at the British Institute in Eastern Africa, Nairobi.
Musangi is not only an independent feminist and queer thinker but also a dedicated practitioner in the realms of art, academia, and creative writing. Their role as a scholar and performance artist is characterized by a profound exploration of possibilities and a critical examination of the limitations imposed by traditional norms within both the academic and artistic spheres. Musangi is particularly interested in challenging the prescribed norms within the academy and the art marketplace, as well as engaging with the diverse audiences shaped by these practice-knowledges.
Musangi's academic endeavors have consistently drawn inspiration from narrative and its potential contributions to black theory. Their work is marked by a commitment to navigating a time-place world that transcends the exceptionalism of old ethnographies and resists the universalism of post-human white worlds. Musangi's unique perspective and interdisciplinary approach underscore their commitment to reshaping established paradigms and fostering a more inclusive dialogue within the fields of art and academia.
guest instructors
Rose Jepkorir Kiptum is a curator based in Nairobi, Kenya. Alongside artists and affiliating practices, she works to create opportunities/spaces for artists to encounter each other in areas of interest. Selected work include; A Seat at a Table (2019), Burden of Memory: Considering German Colonial History in Africa (Yaounde, 2019), From Here to When (2019), Wanakuboeka Feelharmonic (2018), and Naijographia: A play on traveling time and place (2017).
Jared Onyango is a Kenyan dancer and choreographer based in Nairobi. Trained at the Performing Arts Research and Training Studios in Brussels, Belgium, Onyango uses performance as the medium for investigating public spaces, human movement and human contacts with these spaces. He is the co-founder and chairperson of Tempo Arts Centre, a community based organization in Lucky Summer Estate, Nairobi that is focused on conservation of the environment and the Nairobi rivers and nurturing youth talents. He frequently participates in the workshops and activities of the dance school Ecole des Sables in Senegal.
Joseph Kanyenje is a dancer choreographer who can work with, dancers and actors off all ages and experience level. Proficiency at organizing live performance specialized in large theatre productions. Joseph has specialised in dance with persons with disabilities. And also teach at several dance crews but it is not formal He goes as an experience choreographer in community centers mostly and social halls. Joseph got his dance training from attending dance workshop done by choreographers local and international. And also through experience from working through the years.
Musyoki Mutua is a multi-talented artist hailing from the vibrant Akamba community in Kenya. As a singer, composer, and poet, Musyoki has embarked on a creative journey like no other with the project "Syokimau's Last Prophecy." With a deep reverence for the traditions and mysticism of the Akamba culture, Musyoki's work is a heartfelt exploration of the life and prophecies of Syokimau, a renowned Kamba prophetess. Through music, poetry, and storytelling, Musyoki seeks to not only share the fascinating tale of Syokimau but also to immerse audiences in the wonders of this ancient culture. As a griot, Musyoki passionately endeavors to preserve and present the rich heritage of the Akamba community, weaving together history, metaphysics, and artistry into a captivating tapestry that transcends borders and generations. In a world of artistic innovation, Musyoki Mutua stands as a cultural guardian, determined to ensure that the wisdom of the past resonates profoundly with the present and the future.
Ogutu Muraya is a writer and theater maker whose work is embedded in the practice of Orature. In his work, he searches for new forms of storytelling where socio-political aspects merge with the belief that art is an important catalyst for questioning certainties. He studied International Relations at USIU-Africa and graduated in 2016 with a Master in Arts at the Amsterdam University of the Arts - DAS Theatre. He has been published in the Kwani? Journal, Chimurenga Chronic, Rekto:Verso, Etcetera Magazine, NT Gent’s The Golden Book series, among others. His performative works, storytelling & collaborations have featured in several theatres and festivals including- La Mama (NYC), The Hay Festival (Wales), HIFA (Harare), NuVo Arts Festival (Kampala), Spoken Wor:l:ds (Berlin), Globe to Globe Festival (London), SICK Festival (Manchester), Ranga Shankara (Bangalore), Afrovibes Festival (Amsterdam), Spielart (Munich), Theater Spektakel (Zurich), Festival Theaterformen (Braunschweig), Theatre is Must Forum (Alexandria), Theatre Commons (Tokyo) & within East Africa. In 2019 Ogutu received the title of ‘best production on spoken word’ as part of the Sanaa Theatre Awards in Nairobi for his solo performance ‘Because I Always Feel like Running’. Ogutu is also a recipient of The Eric Brassem Exchange Certificat. He was recognized as a talent in the 2017- 2018 Amsterdams Fonds voor de Kunst - 3 Package Deal. Ogutu is based in Nairobi where he continues his artistic practice and runs Maabara-performance incubator.
Dr Onyango Oketch is a sculpture and installation artist, human and social justice activist and commentary writer. He is a lecturer in the Department of Design and Creative Media at the Technical University of Kenya. He writes on the politics of public space, popular culture and visual culture. Oketch’s research focuses on the politics of art and into life, censorship and iconoclasm. He holds a BFA and MFA from the School of the Art Institute of Chicago and a DPhil in Fine Art from the University of Oxford.
Oketch was the winner of the Public Sculpture Commission for the Old Road Campus Research Building, University of Oxford (2013) and Resident Artist in the “Open Studio Program on State Street” in Chicago (September 2006). His awards include; The Clarendon Scholarship Award, the University of Oxford (2009); MFA Fellowship Award from the School of the Art Institute of Chicago (2006); Dean’s Award Scholarship from the School of the Art Institute of Chicago (1999 & 2004) and Gold Circle Award from Columbia Scholastic Press Association of Columbia University, New York (2001).
His activism on human rights and social justice include: campaigning for the ban on the use of child soldiers; reform of the juvenile justice system in America and the abolition of the death penalty in Illinois (1997/2000); the independence of East Timor for East Timorese Action Network-Chicago (1999/2000) and as a Grassroots Educator for Illinois Peace Action for the ban on the manufacture and use of anti-personnel landmines (1997).
Rosie Olang’ Odhiambo is a writer, artist and independent curator living and working in Nairobi, Kenya. She understands her various roles in the arts as framed by the late Toni Morrison relation to work: “I really only do one thing. I read books. I teach books. I write books, I think about books, it’s one job.”
Similarly, she really only does one thing, she looks at and thinks about art, she reads about art, she writes about it, she makes art primarily in community, it’s one job. Rosie has worked in research, communications, writing and project management roles with arts and culture organizations in East Africa and the United States. She is currently the co-founder of Magic Door, an experimental imprint in Nairobi, and serves as the Head of Programs at the Nairobi Contemporary Art Institute. She is an artist book and zine enthusiast, finds pleasure in gardening, and has learnt patience teaching her dog Arlo to respond to his name.
guest artists
Kaloki Nyamai
Born 1985, Kituii, Kenya. Lives and works in Nairobi. A self-taught artist, Nyamai began his career by drawing in charcoal and documenting and complicating the perception of the life in the slum settlement where he grew up. Grounded in hidden narratives, uneasy stories of identity, environment and memory, offering fragments to be pieced together slowly. The lengthy, searching process employed in the making of the works is mirrored in the experience of viewing them. Nyamai explores the parallels between the past and the present through richly-layered, multimedia works. Drawing heavily on the stories of the Kamba people, the works explore how history and identity are intertwined and how this has informed the identities of people living in present day, post-colonial Kenya.
“Nyamai’s canvas feels like some sort of rapture, a distinguished composite of loss and reinvention – a symbolic erasure and preservation of memory. What the fire erases, his canvases preserve as debris of memory. Like jazz music, his canvases are an improvised composition – spontaneous, extemporization, ad-libbing. Each brush, strokes over continuously repeating cycles of stitching that alters the visual. He depends on the contours of the burnt and ripped canvas and the possibilities of the stitch’s harmony.” Recent exhibition projects include, 2019 ‘Mwaki Nginya Evinda Enge (The Fire Next Time)’, Circle Art Gallery, Nairobi, Kenya, 2018 ‘I Am Not My Father’, EBONY/CURATED, Cape Town, South Africa, 2018 Kampala Art Biennale, Kampala, Uganda
events
Image credit: Amani Nation (Unsplash)
Daytrip to Nairobi city centre
with jared onyango, joseph kanyenje and musyoki mutua
The guided tour will be run by three local artists, Jared Onyango, Joseph Kanyenje and Musyoki Mutua, who know the inner workings of the city centre, sharing their personal perspectives on the history of Nairobi along with the spaces within the city that inspire their practice.
Locations included in tour:
- KICC Building
- Nairobi Gallery
- Melodica Store
- Lithuli Avenue
- River Road district
- Government office building district
After taking this tour students will be able to orientate themselves within the city, gain a better understanding of the history of the city and how it affects our movements and how people relate to the city as a result of this history. It will also give the students an understanding of how creatives navigate the city to get the materials they need for their practice which is a nuanced process.
jared onyango bio | Site
joseph Kanyenje bio | site
musyoki mutua bio
Image credit: Syowia Kyambi
Exploring the Kenyan Visual Art Scene: A Historical Perspective
with Syowia Kyambi
The session entails going through a mind map of the Kenyan visual art scene created by Syowia Kyambi between 2013 - 2015. The map entails which organisations and creative spaces started when and were run by whom and with which funding bodies., giving insight into how the creative fields have been developed and under which agendas. This will provide a framework for the students to understand the types of aesthetics and practices they will come across during the residency. It will also assist them in identifying which spaces they may want to engage with during their time in Nairobi.
bio | site
Syllabus
Day Trip to Olorgesailie pre-historic site with untethered magic staff
Olorgesailie pre-historic site is world renown as the “factory of stone tools” and the only place in the world with such a large number.
This Acheulian site is located about 90kms South-West of Nairobi on Magadi Road. It is characterized by in-situ displays of prehistoric materials including numerous hand axes, fossilized skeletons of extinct species of elephants and hippopotamus dating back from 1.2 million years ago. Other attractions include a camp site, bandas and nature trail.
The prominence and accumulation of human tools represent actual camping places of early men and evidence that human species had a tropical origin. The site is in a lake basin that existed about 100,000 to 200,000 years ago.
Olorgesailie has excellently preserved biological and cultural evidence about the evolution of man. This was made possible by heavy falls of alkaline volcanic ash from the nearby Mt. Suswa and Mt. Longonot, which might have contributed much to the accumulated ash in the lake basin. There is evidence of humid climate during part of the Middle Pleistocene that is given by temporary lakes and swamps that exist in the area today. The sediments left by the lake cover an area of 80 km².
More info
Installation View of Sane Wadu "I Hope So". Courtesy NCAI.
visit to c& reading room and NAIROBI CONTEMPORARY ART INSTITUTE (NCAI)
The Contemporary And (C&) office and reading room is located in one of Nairobi's first mall buildings. The space hosts artists, writers and curators and provides a space of encounter to write, read, research and exchange.
Nairobi Contemporary Art Institute (NCAI) is a non-profit visual art space dedicated to the growth and preservation of contemporary art in East Africa. Established in 2020 and opening its doors to the public in January 2022, NCAI aims to build on a legacy of initiatives seeking to tell the stories of the artists and projects that have shaped the region’s contemporary art scene. Through exhibitions, the development of an East African art archive, a public program of talks, and a multidisciplinary educational program, it hopes to serve as a hub and resource for the thriving East African art community and as an inspiring cultural space for audiences.
site
research discussion circles: Where does the curatorial begin?
with rose jepkorir kiptum (C&)
and don handa (NCAI)
In this seminar/tour, two Nairobi-based curators consider the different forms/formats that have been adopted for curatorial work within the context of Nairobi, Kenya, referring to previous and ongoing projects to explore various responses to the current needs of the artistic landscape of Nairobi.
What are the current conditions of artistic production within the local scene, vis-à-vis what transpires internationally? What responsibilities and responses are and have been borne/assumed in negotiating these conditions?
rose jepkorir kiptum bio
don handa bio
syllabus
Because I Always Feel Like Running (2017-2018); Essay Performance by Ogutu Muraya. Beursschouwburg, Brussels, Belgium
Time Accumulates
with Ogutu Muraya
Outside, the wind of recurrence blew gently over the earth – Ben Okri
The present is a product of a past that is full of unacknowledged and incalculable loss. The political dilemmas in the contemporary world demands on us to face this past and avoid its recurrence by engaging in four key practices as summed up by Professor Boaventura de Sousa Santos: democratize, decolonize, decommodify, and depatriarchalize. I am convinced that at the core of these practices is a call on us to unlearn, to unhabit, to re-associate, to rewire and re-order our lived realities, imaginations, perceptions and perspectives. As a theatre-maker and storyteller I am interested with this call to un-establish and its place within performance practices. I want to explore with you what this means to un-establish, what labor does it demand of us, what are the processes involved, where are the points of resistance, doubt, discontent and disconnection? I will propose a collective reading and debate of a story by science fiction writer Ursula K. Le Guin. The dilemma with which the story confronts the reader will serve as the basis for group discussions and active artistic provocations.
ogutu muraya bio | site
syllabus
the artist as maker and researcher: fusing practice, philosophy, theory and politics
with Onyango Oketch
What does our current time demand of art? How can art speak to the issues of this time? This workshop is structures as a series of conversations that examine the issues, ideas and strategies that art can adopt to express itself in a philosophy that is both material and intellectual, while functioning as a political palimpsests of that allows the underwritings of life, ritual, spirituality, subversion, absurdity or witness to become legible experiences.
“Research has to go through a body; it has to be lived in some sense—transformed into some sort of lived experience—in order to become whatever we might call art.” Discussions will focus on questions which arise from participants’ areas of focus and the questions and strategies that can help their practice and written research interest develop shape and form.
onyango oketch bio
syllabus
Image Courtesy of Kaloki Nyamai