STELOO The sound and fashion artist breaking boundaries in Accra with his experimental aesthetics

The sound and fashion artist breaking boundaries in Accra

Steloo

Steloo (aka Evans Mireku Kissi) is one of a kind. The sound and fashion artist spearheads Accra’s experimental scene with his improvised sets fusing electronic beats with traditional instruments, found sounds and the rattle and roll of everyday objects. His inimitable talents have taken him to Kenya, Côte d'Ivoire and Germany to perform, but Nataal encountered him last at Design Indaba 2018 in Cape Town — where his show revolved around samples of birds tweeting and airplanes soaring, interspersed with cymbal crashes and the rustle of wrapping paper. “I like to challenge my creative process by layering and exploring soundscapes that build up into a party,” he says. Equally uncompromising is Steloo’s dress sense, which lies somewhere between swimmer, cowboy and flâneur. He pairs his signature wax-print trapper caps and sunglasses with short shorts, vintage blazers, armbands and pulled-up socks. “My fashion is like my music, I make it up and it’s everything that I love.”

Forming a loose collective with fellow Ghanaian mavericks including stylist Daniel M Quist, photographer Francis Kokoroko and fine artist Nana Anoff, Steloo and friends host their own multidisciplinary events around their city. “The shows we’d want to be at don’t exist, so we create them. It’s up to us to embrace new energies and spaces. With varying ideas but a united front, we seem to be unconsciously pushing the boundaries in a strong way,” he adds. “Right now my ideas are bigger than myself. I wait for my craft to surprise me; I don’t know where it’s going to take me tomorrow.”