23/06/2026
ZK/U FELLOW INTRODUCTION / NGMINVIELU KUUIRE / 01 – 20 APRIL 2026
kuuire is a Ghanaian multidisciplinary artist whose practice spans photography, digital art, and filmmaking. Based in Accra, her work investigates established social systems concerning identity, memory, sexuality, mental health, and gender roles within the Ghanaian context. Through deeply personal and symbolic storytelling, she creates evocative visuals that invite viewers to confront complex emotions and embrace vulnerability.
Her multidisciplinary body of work "Vessels of Continuity: For Those Who Grieve" explores grief as a physical inhabitant; a presence that lives within the body and resists disappearance. Grounded in Dagara culture, Ngminvielu uses cowrie shells as symbolic vessels and "memory holders." Traditionally a form of spiritual and physical currency, these minerals serve as a bridge between ancestral legacy and personal loss. By placing them in direct relationship with the human form, she position the body as a living archive where grief is physically situated.
The work oscillates between the gravity of grounded compositions and the buoyancy of suspension. Drawing from the Dagara understanding of memory as an elemental force, she uses flight as a metaphor for reorientation. Rather than seeking "closure," the work proposes that we can move with our histories. It asks how the weight of loss can be transformed into a movement that allows for both breath and a continuous state of becoming.
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This project is funded by the Va-Bene Scholarship and Mentorship Residency Abroad (VS-MRA).
Photos 1 & 2 (c) Elisa Georgi, 3 (c) Anastasiia Sharoshkina
