Ama Ata Aidoo Arts Fellow Wana Udobang presented her first mixed media installation, “Dirty Laundry,” in Abuja on December 15–20, 2022. The traveling installation had earlier opened to the public, April 28–30, 2022 in Lagos, at Whitespace Ikoyi. It then traveled to Port-Harcourt where the exhibition was mounted at The Boys Quarters Project Space, which was once the old office of human rights activist Ken Saro-Wiwa. The Abuja exhibition winds up its national travel for 2022. Dirty Laundry will be installed at the Atrium of the Shehu Musa Yar’adua Foundation in Abuja, following the end of 16 days of activism against gender-based violence.
This installation is an immersive experience interconnecting personal narratives, histories, experiences, and imaginaries as a form of catharsis for the poet and the viewer. Featuring poems screen printed on canvas hanging from laundry lines, the installation will also include thought-provoking performances that explore issues around womanhood, sexual and gender violence, feminine agency, healing, and reimagination.
The hanging poems tell many personal stories for the viewer to experience while walking through the space, a physical representation of the metaphor “hanging your dirty laundry in public.” The event will be accompanied by talk presentations and online discussions on the role of art in social justice movements or activism that seeks to create change.
Udobang has observed that “Every day, we see how our cultures and societies repress the voices of women and girls. We continue to lose women and girls to sexual and intimate partner violence. I believe in Nina Simone’s statement that “an artist must reflect the times.” As an artist, I hope this exhibition is not only documenting and reflecting the insidious ways that women are violated in both our domestic and public lives but that it shows the ways we utilize imagination to heal.”
“Dirty Laundry” received support from the Ford Foundation.