Love and the feast: D.A.P's trip to Kumasi
- bloggerrddm
- Jan 31
- 8 min read
Updated: Mar 7
I only recently developed wanderlust. It could have something to do with the fact that this country is... well, we all know where it's going. Also the fact that I'm constantly on social media. I used to exist as if there was no world—only Ghana. Going to university, leaving university (thank god), having classmates who managed to get out of this place and meeting people from other places forced to see the world and eventually think, "...you know whattttt...?" That's when wanderlust reared it's enthusiastic little head.
It’s not even that I thought only Ghana existed; I thought only Accra existed. As in Ghana = Accra. I mean, I've lived here my whole life; traveling always seemed far-fetched. Also, who would I be going to see? My family grew up in La.
I can't remember the exact moment I realised I do want to see the world, but I know it had a lot to do with queer people. Meeting queer people in Accra made me want to meet queer people in every other African country and city, but I realised I couldn't wait till I was rolling in enough cedis to convert to dollars and now be able to afford a plane ticket. I could start by touring Ghana. At my big age, I had only been to one region apart from the one I grew up in. Embarrassing.
This is the part where I refer to my previous post. Remember I said we had a couple of partnerships in the pipeline? Shoutout to our researcher, who helped us bag one with Perforcraze International Artist Residency. We'd been talking for weeks and at some point it seemed to me like it wouldn't happen, until we got the confirmation email.
Long story short: The DAP team went to Kumasi for two weeks.
We spent two weeks living not only together but with no less than 20 other people we did not know. Mind you, the team members had met only once before that time, and we didn’t spend longer than an hour together. I couldn't imagine what it would be like, so I didn't even try; I just packed my bags and went to Circle.
After a six-hour journey, we arrived at the pIAR residency, and our two-week adventure began. As a kid, I always wondered why so many people had boring white walls that would only gather dirt in a matter of months, so the first thing I noticed at pIAR was the black-and-white wall. I almost hurt my neck staring at it. Weeks later, I learned that the person in charge of the space had mixed feelings about the wall—not because of how it looked but because of what it represented. The walls are white with black handprints on them.
pIAR is a constant work in progress, and I like that about it. Almost everyday, something was being created or renovated—not just by the artists in residency, but the artisans and other workers in the house. The outside wall was recently built; there were ongoing paintings on the walls inside the house, and right next to the residency home, construction workers and pIAR residents set up for Love Feast.
The night the DAP team arrived, a microphone was passed around for each person to introduce themselves. We shared our names, pronouns, and the reason we were there. I noticed two girls leaning onto each other, swaying from side to side until it was their turn to speak. So sweet. No less than thirty people shared their names, pronouns, and their reason for being at the residency. "I'm a workshop participant," "I'm the matron of this space," "I'm here to learn," "I'm here because I had to come home," and the honorary mention, "I'm here for love and the feast." There was a transwoman who said her pronouns are "she/her/beauty". It literally gave me life.
We arrived at the beginning of the week, and Love Feast was on Saturday. Preparing for Love Feast reminded me of my childhood. During Easter and Christmas holidays, my extended family members would come together to cook, clean, and decorate my grandmother's home. At pIAR, some of us helped the construction workers by carrying cement to the event grounds, and the rest of us helped with cooking. It was a lot of cooking.
This year, Love Feast was held next to the pIAR residency home instead of inside it. As promised, there was security at the gate and lots of food and drinks—enough to feed about five hundred people. The theme of the feast was "Home is resistance." The feast is a great introduction to the residency. It starts with short film and documentary screenings that speak to the work the team and the residents do at pIAR.
Model: Koko Boanyah
I suppose the best way to describe Love Feast is a ball. It was a fashion show, a documentary screening, an awards night, a concert, and a good old Ghanaian party all in one. Love Feast is a great introduction to the pIAR residency and the work Va-Bene does. This is important since the feast is open to anyone who lives in the town, the introduction at the beginning of the event and the address by Va-Bene right before the celebration started were necessary.
Elikem Va-Bene [AKA crazinisT artisT] born 1981 in Ho, Ghana, is a trans woman who lives in Kumasi and works internationally as a multidisciplinary activist and artist. She's also a curator, philanthropist, and founder and artistic director of crazinisT artisT studiO (TTO), Our Railway Cinema Gallery (ORCG) and perfocraZe International Artists Residency (pIAR). According to Va-Bene, the purpose of pIAR is to radicalise the arts and promote exchange between international and local artists, activists, researchers, curators, and critical thinkers.
One of the things I appreciate about pIAR is the room artists are given to work. There aren't many limitations placed on artists when it comes to their work. They're not even obligated to perform or present excerpts of the projects they worked on during the residency; it's entirely up to the artists to decide if they'd like to share their work.
The performance artists were free to use any space as their stage. There was a dance performance in the front of the residency home, rituals were performed on the grounds next to the residency home; and a personal favourite, the dance and ballroom performances that happened during the Love fEAST.
There was an artist who spoke profoundly of death. He said he was fascinated by the way people spoke about the deceased; that one thing he noticed was how even unpleasant people are portrayed in a positive light when they die. He goes from house to house asking for items once owned by people who passed away, and he uses them to create art. In his presentation, he showed us something that looked like an obituary and explained how he created that image. In one hand, he held a spray bottle, and in the other, a piece of cloth. You can google "wet reveal canvas" or "water activated art" to get an idea of how he works. He was heavily inspired by his uncle's death. I especially liked that he invited the audience to try it out for themselves, but my favourite part was when he said that art like this takes time, and he often uses that time to process his grief. He was heavily inspired by his uncle's passing.
There weren't only visual artists in residency. There were dancers, singers, drag performers, and, to my greatest pleasure, writers. It's not just because I'm a writer. I strongly feel writers should collaborate with other artists. For example, in songwriting camps, there should be poets and authors; performance artists like dancers and actors too should work with writers. Writers should work with visual artists and curators to create more immersive exhibitions that engage more than just one sense, e.g vision, hearing, etc. The writers at pIAR wrote notes and passed them around, they recited their pieces, collaborated with performance artists and wrote poems and song lyrics on the walls.
The wildest part of my stay at the residency was how we all managed to live together without major conflict. There weren't arguments about who used what house item and how, there was no loss of personal belongings—except for those who forgot something of theirs in Kumasi (me), and even then, those items were found and held onto until they could be retrieved by the owners; there were no queues in front of the bathroom or at the kitchen; and conflict was promptly addressed and resolved as a group (I saw that on my first night at the residency). Breakfast could be had anywhere in the house that wasn't a bedroom, but dinner was always eaten together outside the building. We were advised not to feed the cats who would sit at our feet and stare longingly at our food-filled hands. Apparently, they tend to get aggressive when they're fed. How interesting.
Va-Bene spoke with the house many times before she left for a work trip during the DAP's second and last week at pIAR. In her last conversation with us, she spoke about the Love fEAST. She said while it's a celebration, it's also a protest and "a battle." After every high comes a low, I guess. She told us she wasn't present for most of the feast because she was speaking with the police who were called on us for holding the event. No one knows what exactly they were told, but the officers admitted that what they were told was different from what they saw when they arrived. She told us that the walls built around the pIAR home did not always exist; they had to be constructed after a number of altercations occurred between her and the people in the neighbourhood. This further explains the presence of security guards at the entrance and exit of the Love fEAST.
We were advised not to engage with anyone who showed any sign of hostility towards us. A member of the DAP team went out one night to buy snacks; the shop owner casually asked if she was from pIAR (probably because he'd never seen her in the area before, and he'd noticed that pIAR usually has new people coming in and out). She calmly said no; she lives somewhere else. Seconds later, a few pIAR residents arrived at the shop and, on their way back, said, "See you at the house!" to her. LOL. As if that wasn't enough, we ended up at the same table with him at Love Feast, and he giggled as soon as he noticed her. Days later, we learned from the residents that they were very good friends of pIAR. It showed, the way they smiled during the very queer performances during the Love Feast, and the way they said hi everytime we walked by their store. She had absolutely nothing to worry about.
It's comforting even now that I'm back in Accra, to know that despite the hostility and queerphobia, pIAR also has friends in the neighbourhood; somewhere for the queeries to sing and dance and be themselves even outside the residency home. Bless them.
On our first night, Va-Bene described the residency as a black hole--a good one. She said it sucks everyone in but it never gets full. The house usually has residents, mentees, apprentices learning cooking and fashion design and the pIAR staff. Breakfast, lunch and dinner are provided by the residency with no contribution whatsoever from the residents, some staying as long as three months. And you know the wildest part? All this, including Love fEAST which had over 300 people in attendance, and the scholarships Va-Bene offered to three lucky residents, is done with no external funding. It's all from Va-Bene's pocket. So I don't know who's reading this right now, but if you can, feel free to make a donation :)
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