By Sarah Luddy
Adam Yawe’s solo exhibition Debe at the Nairobi National Museum’s Creativity Gallery is an exploration of everyday artifacts and the untold narratives they carry. Anchored in the word “debe”, meaning container in Kiswahili and (audio) speaker in Sheng, Yawe’s work reframes objects as vessels for memory, cultural commentary, and auditory storytelling.
Many of Yawe’s reference objects derive from the urban environment, however, in this exhibition we also see cultural items from the museum alongside those from the streets of Nairobi, displayed in a way that moves the focus away from their functionality and onto their form. Yawe has turned the dictum “form follows function” onto its head in this very thoughtful exhibition, using the form of functional objects to meditate on design.
Intallation view: “Mtaro stools” & “Makangas”
Yawe dubs himself an “object storyteller” and mines urban Kenyan material cutlure as an aesthetic basis for the creation of artefacts. As he explained, regarding his project Vitu Vya Sanaa,
I believe there is a need to observe our culture post-colonialism, and use it as inspiration…going forward into the future.
He continues, “Many artists and designers of African origin are searching for inspiration that is both meaningful and relevant to their heritage. In my experience, it led me to search for as much documentation of my traditional culture as I could find. The results of this search have been texts and images often coming from the point of view of a foreigner, frequently portraying this traditional culture as primitive and backward. This has caused a feeling of disconnection between me and my heritage, and it is a feeling that many of my contemporaries share. I have come to accept that a return to traditional cultural practice is all but impossible, but in a post-colonial urban setting, we are surrounded by meaningful material culture on a daily basis.”
Pokot Nacharr from the collection of the Nairobi National Museum
Yawe’s interest in Kenyan cultural heritage shows in his display of items from the museum, such as a Pokot nacharr (headrest) and the nyatiti, accompanied by texts which explain in simple terms the uses and significance of the objects. The minimalism of the display encourages us to observe the objects for their qualities of form, more than for their function.
In this exhibition, Yawe works with the concept of skeuomorphism to examine the elemental design features of functional objects. A skeuomorph is a derivative object that retains ornamental design attributes of structures that were necessary in the original. In other words, an object that borrows features from another. For Yawe’s purposes, the features are necessary on the functional parent object but when borrowed for the skeuomorph become purely ornamental, again drawing our attention to the form and meditating on the typically unnoticed design elements of everyday material culture.
Installation view: “Kanjo Clamp Bag“
A particularly striking piece in which Yawe employs this method is “Kanjo Clamp Bag”. In this piece the multi-triangular form of the steel jaws of the clamps which city council workers use on errant vehicles are transformed into decorative elements on handbags, giving them a futuristic and combative feel.
Pieces of leather used to make a shoe are deconstucted from their “shoe” form and displayed on the wall as geometric elements of design. Next to an image of concrete drainage elements is a minimal, elegant “mtaro stool”, based on the same shape. Colourful kangas, that most ubiquitous Kenyan piece of cloth are displayed hanging on the walls. The elements of the printed design are not traditional motifs, but derived from the shapes of matatu speakers.
Installation view: the deconstruction of shoes into shapes
The nyatiti is recreated as the “Nyadebe” (see header photo), incorporating, once again, a matatu speaker. The speaker replaces the traditional gourd and sound hole of the nyatiti while retaining its form, featuring the iconic yoke shaped neck with nylon strings, rather than the historical cow tendon. One wonders if this is also a skeumorph. The nyadebe follows the form, but does it follow the function? Is the nyatiti-like design necessary for the production of musical sound via the matatu speaker?
In Debe, Adam Yawe argues that culture isn’t just preserved in museums; it’s actively built in the present, shaped by the objects we use and the stories we assign to them. He cautions that while appreciation of past cultural artifacts is vital, the ongoing act of storytelling through new creations is equally important.
Debe is a compelling meditation on culture, craft, and context. It challenges visitors to see beyond function to the form and to recognize common jua kali manifestations of material culture as design. Yawe exhorts the viewer to photograph, share and replicate any of the objects in the exhibition, sublimating the desire for purchase often created by designers, turning the pieces into debe for cultural memory.
In association with the exhibition there will be a live performance inspired by the piece Nyadebe performed by electronic musician Ng’at Maler on Wednesday 2 July at the History of Kenya Theatre (Nairobi National Museum) and a walk-through of the exhibition by Adam Yawe on 5 July, 2pm. The exhibition ends on 8 July.
Read more about Adam Yawe’s project Vitu Vya Sanaa on www.vituvyasanaa.org.