Dorothy Akpene Amenuke Dorothy Akpene Amenuke’s fabric and fibre objects disrupt given expectations about sculpture. They are formed through laborious sessions in which a community of family, students and friends work with her. Amenuke’s A cloth of Tools in Orderly Disorderly is a two sided piece made from cotton fabric, jute fibre with raw cotton fillings. The piece is a play on the idea of the ‘tool box’. On a closer look, the lesions and puffed areas on the surface of the worked fabric refer vaguely to a variety of tools in Amenuke’s studio. But of what use are podgy, pallid and limp tools? Bright Ackwerh Bright Ackwerh’s satirical illustrations appropriate narratives from popular culture to make socio-political commentaries. He exaggerates popular iconic personalities into cartoon characters who metaphorically become archetypes of broader attitude traits of just anybody. He critiques scathingly and praises lavishly. The commentary itself borrows wittingly from a myriad of sources, these transform his illustrations into whole episodes. The narrative situations may require some assistance to navigate, since they are mostly imbued with double, if not triple entendres. His work also engages subtly with the phenomenon of public poster making and display. Afia Prempeh Sarpong For Orderly Disorderly, Afia Prempeh paints portraits of prominent figures and landscapes that deal with religious themes. Prempeh’s process involves staging photography of her subjects and inventing landscapes and sceneries. She employs the extra-painterly technique of montaging images collected from random sources — magazines, internet, etc — into her compositions). Eugene Edzorho Eugene Edzorho has remained committed to exploring sites of irreversible disorder; places which cannot be returned to their former state after they have been traumatized by extractive activities like mining, quarrying or even logging. From these sites, he collects rocks and stones with which he creates composite geometric forms suspended on nylon lines. The rocks have either been expelled from the bowels of the earth or washed from riverbeds at Galamsey sites. The otherwise heavy stone hangings appear impossibly weightless. Kwabena Afriyie Poku Borrowing from systems of martial arts training, Kwabena Afriyie Poku’s three screen video installation with sound presents a test of the practitioner’s sense of space. What are the options when one only has the thickness of a fence wall or the rectangular limits of a raised concrete platform to balance on? Art and martial arts Katas come into graceful conversation in the light of indiscriminate destruction and unjustified instant justice. Patrick Tagoe-Turkson Patrick Tagoe-Turkson’s work alludes to time-honoured art practices like traditional flag making, that link approaches of contemporary art creation to belief systems. His work involves drawing, painting, mixed media, performance, video and sculpture. In Dialogue, a collaboration between Patrick Tagoe-Turkson (Ghana) and Eross Istvan (Hungary), food as a common denominator among humans becomes a humorous means by which to allegorize individual and collective struggles. Dr. Sylvanus Kwami Amenuke uliana Asare Dr. Sylvanus Kwami Amenuke was born in Akoefe in the Volta Region in 1940. He entered Mawuli in 1954 till 1958. For a while, he taught Art, Ewe and Geography at Peki Secondary. In 1965 he taught Art, Ewe, Geography and Science at Awudome Secondary School and left for College of Art, KNUST to study art. In Kwame Nkrumah University of Science and Technology, Amenuke won the Mobil Oil Ghana Ltd. Award for the best painting (1970) and the Grace True Blood (American) Award for the best work of art. He graduated with a First Class Honours Degree in Painting (1970). He was awarded the Hays Fulbright International Scholarship, USA for Graduate Studies. He obtained the Master of Fine Art Degree in Painting in 1972 from Kent State University, Ohio, USA and continued to the University of Connecticut, Ohio USA, where he obtained the Doctor of Education in Art Education Degree, specializing in Visual Art, Curriculum Development. At his graduation in Connecticut, Amenukes’s citation described him as an: “Emissary of Ghana and a Genius who appears on the scene quietly and disappears”. Dr. Amenuke has rendered curriculum services in Visual Arts to the Curriculum Research and Development Division of GES from 1983 to 2007. He was chairman and leader of various curriculum panels to develop Teaching Syllabuses for Kindergarten, Primary and Senior High Schools. Dr. Amenuke served on the National Planning Committee for the implementation of school reforms (1987 – 1992), representing the interest of Visual Arts. He has rendered External Examination services in Visual Arts to the University of Education, Winneba since 1982. Dr. S.K. Amenuke has produced several Visual Arts Teachers at the Masters Degree level and eighteen (18) PhD graduates who teach in Ghanaian Universities and Polytechnics. Dr. Amenuke has made singular and dedicated contributions to Education in Visual Arts in Ghana, but goes quietly unnoticed by many.
Kofi Adjei Kofi Adjei is a lecturer and a practising artist who has dedicated his research to the life and work of K.K Broni. He teaches Ceramics at the Industrial Art Department, Kwame Nkrumah University of Science and Technology (KNUST). He holds MFA Ceramics and is currently pursuing his PhD in African Art and Culture at KNUST. His research interests include: Ceramics mixed media, Aesthetics and Criticism, Materials and methods in ceramics production, ornamentation in architecture and Indigenous pottery production in Ghana. Adjei has published in both local and international journals in the areas of ceramics mixed media, ceramics raw materials, and traditional art and culture. Adjei has held several exhibitions in galleries, hotels and private homes in Ghana. Romildo Olympio Olympio paints moments in martial art moves and stances in his sharp contrasting black and white pictures. He photographs himself and his karate colleagues and appropriates images of other martial art stars such as Hung li, Cung Lea and Alexandra Recchia. These paintings of martial art stances seem to be made out of screen printing, but have been painted by Romildo. A careful rendition of these paintings are reminiscent of the dedicated constant repetition and practice he and others go through in the study of martial arts to attain mastery of their moves. Mawuenya B. K. Amudzi Mawuenya Amudzi creates installations from disused cathode ray tube (CRT) television screens and computer monitors. His process involves taking photographs of activities in the scrap yards and repairer workshops, where he collects the materials, and transferring these images on transparent stickers onto the screens creating image objects. He joins the objects with metallic bolts, nuts and binding wire, animating them with light fixtures, to compose his monumental installations. Light emissions from the monitors through the images gives the form a theatrical quality. Praises Adu Benhene Praises Adu Benhene’s damp decommissioned clothes — folded, stacked, hanged, cast in p.o.p — collected from illegal mining sites and car fitting shops are presented in sculptural and installation form. Not only do they embody a presence of things in decay but also of materials frozen in time and of things that are becoming. The clothes that have been preserved in their natural state with accumulation of dirty oil stains, sweat and dust have molds/mildew/ fungi growths on them. The works emit smells resonant of decay and emerging life forms. Esther Ama Agyemang Anokye Tree branches, clay, square wire meshes, nails, and metal binding wires come together to compose Esther Anokye’s imagined landscapes inspired by children’s uninhibited drawings. Her clay is left unfired. Her three-dimensional drawings in clay are made by spreading, pressing, throwing and sprinkling on the objects. As time acts on the clay it dries; the cracks that emerge become nature’s own drawing marks. Paul Sagoe & Felicia Oduro (Collective) The Oduro-Sagoe pair produces objects inspired by “alien” forms as well as the aesthetics of electrical wiring systems. Their mechanized assemblages are made from aluminum cans, metal rods, anal bulb syringes, parts of stoves, shower heads, etc. through processes such as welding, gluing and binding. Their fantastical forms are animated by electrically- or battery-powered motors and are set with functions such as vibration and rotation. Their electrical cable installations incorporate dysfunctional meter boards, PVC pipes, switch boxes, and distribution boards. Andrews Kpakpo Allotey: Andrews Kpakpo Allotey creates fabrications from plastics, enamel basins, woks, aluminum buckets and other metals collected from head porters, scrap sites, food sellers and homes. His work explores economic concepts such as trade and labor. Apart from existing in the matrix of everyday commercial activities and capital exchanges, the objects he repurposes directly appropriate emblems from corporate and traffic iconography. Allotey’s installations fictionalize the everyday as it is known. Larry Adorkor Larry Adorkor’s pseudo-ethnographic process involves collecting objects of material culture from various townships in Kumasi. He learns from the social interactions and systems that characterize his sites of interest and imports them into his display strategies: for example, Adorkor’s installations engage the spectator beyond contemplation to taste foods and interact with board games. By appropriating museum systems of preservation, archiving and displaying cultural objects, Adorkor raises the question of how the white cube space or ideology potentially alienates [cultural] objects from social interactions.