ARTISTS
MO LAUDI
J
MPHO
MOKGADI
MOKGADI
NYAHAN
TACHIE-MENSON
TACHIE-MENSON
TEDDY
PRATT
PRATT
VALERIE
ETITINWO
ETITINWO
INTRODUCTION
How are we looking at our pasts to better understand our present moment to influence our futures? In a not-so-abstract way, we see our heritage as a key to unlocking a more informed future. This way, we activate our heritage as a pathway to new perspectives of self and form vital solutions to unlearning false narratives of who we are.
By tapping into our heritage, we are collectively offering ourselves an opportunity to redirect our gaze to look within and build new pools of knowledge curated by us through us.
This knowledge bears witness to stories that came before and continues to live through us. In this present intersection of mixed realities, We Are Still Here reflects on what it means to be custodians of heritage. What kind of world emerges when people tap into a new era of creation outside of “validated systems?”
We Are Still Here provides cues and tools for self-excavation already embedded within different communities across the globe – Tools that turn us into anthropological archeologists who need not go far to excavate the value stored within. It’s an acknowledgment that our bodies of knowledge serve as sites of memory that hold heritage.
By tapping into our heritage, we are collectively offering ourselves an opportunity to redirect our gaze to look within and build new pools of knowledge curated by us through us.
This knowledge bears witness to stories that came before and continues to live through us. In this present intersection of mixed realities, We Are Still Here reflects on what it means to be custodians of heritage. What kind of world emerges when people tap into a new era of creation outside of “validated systems?”
We Are Still Here provides cues and tools for self-excavation already embedded within different communities across the globe – Tools that turn us into anthropological archeologists who need not go far to excavate the value stored within. It’s an acknowledgment that our bodies of knowledge serve as sites of memory that hold heritage.
CHERRY-ANN DAVIS
Cherry-Ann Davis is a post-colonial, pan-African hybrid ethnographic creator from Trinidad and Tobago. Formerly from the professional design world of advertising, she is now poised as a designer who uses an intersectional feminist, anti-racist decolonial lens through visual communication design by combining research, artistic practice and storytelling traditions. Within her practice “Story as Design and Design as Story” helps navigate the intersections of culture, postcoloniality and decoloniality, storytelling and memories, the pluriverse, creolization and Sankofa. Cherry shares Pan-African stories and experiences with the aim of representing and respecting the past and present, while looking to the future to sustain those stories through accessible formats. Her practice often manifests as visual design, writing, curation of programs and spaces to support and share knowledges beyond the common narratives in design.
Cherry is from the community of Port-of-Spain Trinidad and Tobago which has led the creative charge in the creation of the only instrument in the 20th century, the steel pan. From childhood being immersed in such a creatively rich environment that was resource poor showed her the power of an idea and utilizing what you have to bring it to life with excellence. The interest in drawing, art and design was not fostered as much as interest in business which she holds an associate degree in Marketing and a degree in Business Management with the University of Sunderland. Following her passion in design led her to the Zurich University of Arts (ZHdK) in Switzerland to pursue a masters in visual communication design after completing a degree in Graphic design with the University of Sunderland. She is currently working as a Research Assistant in Design History and Theory at ZHdK.
Cherry is from the community of Port-of-Spain Trinidad and Tobago which has led the creative charge in the creation of the only instrument in the 20th century, the steel pan. From childhood being immersed in such a creatively rich environment that was resource poor showed her the power of an idea and utilizing what you have to bring it to life with excellence. The interest in drawing, art and design was not fostered as much as interest in business which she holds an associate degree in Marketing and a degree in Business Management with the University of Sunderland. Following her passion in design led her to the Zurich University of Arts (ZHdK) in Switzerland to pursue a masters in visual communication design after completing a degree in Graphic design with the University of Sunderland. She is currently working as a Research Assistant in Design History and Theory at ZHdK.
