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_Ghana Airways

Ghana Airways reimagines and examines traditional Ghanaian oral literature through a three-part audio work accompanied by an installation with three suitcases.

2022 Hakeem Adam
EN Visit the project

“Ghana Airways was born out of a desire to ask difficult questions about national identity, African national identities, their ingredient, the chaos of their formation, and their fracturing heritage, all through the music. In Ghana Airways we wanted to achieve an idiosyncratic vision of identity shaped by my lived experience, traced through knowledge of the nation-state preserved in archival material. It was fueled by a burning curiosity about the facets that stitch my minority perspective within the wider fabric that is modern-day Ghana.”

Hakeem Adam, Author, to Docubase

In a three-part audio work and installation, media artist Hakeem Adam explores post colonial Ghanaian identity through “things in which I can hear myself.” He explains that he finds himself contemplating his Ghanian identity whenever he is in an airport.

Combining music, historical recordings of speeches, news clips, advertising jingles and ambient sound, he creates “a sonic patchwork that captures the character of a country that is itself a constructed composite of colonial forces and projected wishes, myths and ideologies,” as written on the IDFA Doclab website. The audio component of the project is accompanied by an installation with three suitcases, each one with a video component displayed in a loop, providing subtle visual hints without distracting from the main audio experience.

Preservation Wishes

Ghana Airways was made with the question of the difficulty in archiving digital work in mind. The problem of providing non-live audiences with comparable experiences to which they can reflect on the themes of the project. Therefore, I want Ghana Airways to be remembered for the various attempts we made to address this difficulty. Through its various parts, the website, audio, and writing, we hope that audiences will always find fertile paths through the landscape of identity the work flies over.

Project at a Glance :

Language : EN
Country : Germany,Ghana
Year : 2022
Author : Hakeem Adam
Producer : Hakeem Adam
Team : Dr. Petra Klusmeyer,Hakeem Adam,Kwame Boafo,Prof. Dennis P Paul,Yinka Danmole
Developers : Hakeem Adam
Designers : Hakeem Adam
Topics : Identity,Migration,Oral History,Post-colonial National Identities
Technologies : Ableton,Houdini,React,Unreal Engine,Vercel,Video
Techniques : 3D,Audio,Creative Writing,Electroacoustic Composition,Installation,Web Design
Exhibition Venues : 13th SAR International Conference on Artistic Research - Bauhaus-Universität Weimar,BLACK MOBILITIES IN THE ATLANTIC WORLD - Institute for Black Atlantic Research,Fak'ugesi African Digital Innovation Festival 2022,IDFA DocLab 2022,Research Networking Day (RND) - CTM Festival 2022,University of Central Lancashire
Awards & Nominations : Digital Cross-Sector Music & Composition-Composers linked Digital arts - Fak’ugesi 2022 Awards for Digital Creativity,Nominee IDFA DocLab Competition for Digital Storytelling
distribution : Pro Helvetia Johannesburg,Refuge Worldwide - Resident 2021
Budget Range : €10000 (spent),€55000 (in-kind hours)
Funders AND Incubators : Breathing Space Grant -Pro Helvetia Johannesburg,Digital Media - Hochschule für Künste Bremen,Electric South
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