KUNA MENDE KWENYE MASHINE (There’s a Bug in the Machine) is the third exhibition in the Art Exchange: Moving Image series. Curated by Jesse Gerard Mpango, a founding member of Ajabu Ajabu—a multimedia curatorial collective based in Dar es Salaam—the exhibition invites visitors to reconsider the rhythms of creation and circulation, offering exploration of an alternative history and genealogy of moving image. It seeks to evoke new perspectives on the diverse narratives and histories surrounding the medium, encouraging a speculative engagement with its evolving role and resonance.
Ajabu Ajabu’s participatory, open-ended programming emphasises decentralised, community-driven models for presenting, producing, and preserving audiovisual work in Tanzania. This ethos is embodied in the exhibition, which delves into creative practices that flourish outside mainstream, industrialised frameworks. In this context, meaning and value are embedded in spaces, conversations, and traditions, where creative work arises organically, shaped by timing, context, and connection rather than by a fixed purpose or locale.
“The formal frames of moving image, film, broadcast, become adaptive, and are capable of holding a scope of associations at the same time - which unfold in multiple directions, acquire new stakes, defy standardization and acquire utility far beyond the scope of their initial intention. KUNA MENDE KWENYE MASHINE emerges as a collective moment of wandering beyond linear trails of thought and established records”
- Jesse Gerard Mpango
Exhibition visitors gathered around Relic 2 by Larry Achiampong.
KUNA MENDE KWENYE MASHINE brings together the work of eight artists and collectives, including three newly commissioned pieces. Through interactive elements, such as installations and performances, audiences are invited to actively engage with the exhibitions’ themes.
The first commissioned work is an installation of fabric sculptures by Tanzanian visual artist and writer Valerie Asiimwe Amani. Inspired by the ecologies of ghosts and whale sharks, the piece delves into themes of contradiction and coexistence. Amani’s practice critically examines how body erotics, language, place, and perceived reality serve to situate, or at times isolate, the self within the broader community.
Zaliwa by Valerie Asiimwe Amani. The piece symbolises the harmonious contradictions of nature, specifically inspired by the whale shark found on the coast of Mafia Island.
Dijay Blaki contributes a performative narration and live dubbing of Christopher Nolan’s 2020 science fiction thriller Tenet. The artist, who belongs to a large subculture of performative translators in the city known as 'djs', merges traditional dubbing techniques with live performance elements, creating an enriched viewing experience that reinterprets the original film’s narrative. Dijay Blaki has translated over 50,000 films into colloquial Swahili and a handful into regional dialects.
The final commission is an installation conceptualised and presented by Mervki Rep, a dynamic fashion collective and creative hub based in Dar es Salaam. The piece aims to rewrite the history of fashion through fabric, creating a spatial intervention that engages viewers in a dialogue about time and history. In May, the group collaborated with Ajabu Ajabu on a workshop as part of the Art Exchange: Moving Image programme, led by British-Ghanaian artist Larry Achiampong. Together, they explored themes of world-building and African cosmology, expanding creative horizons and cultural narratives.
Uzi Wa Nyakati (thread of time) by Mervki Rep. The piece aims to uncover East African cosmology through the ages using mediums such as fashion, performance, drawing, and sculpture.
The exhibition features selected works from the British Council collection, including Samson Kambalu’s I Take The Stairs, I Take My Place In History, Superfly, and Cathedral, along with Larry Achiampong’s Relic 2.
Programming running adjacent to the exhibition includes a listening workshop exploring familial structures and conditions of being related led by Tako Taal, a multidisciplinary artist and filmmaker. It will be followed by a fashion intervention by Mervki Rep on 16th November and a final closing performance on 23rd November.
KUNA MENDE KWENYE MASHINE (There’s a Bug in the Machine) runs from 2nd November until 23rd November 2024 at Mikoko White House, Dar es Salaam.
EXHIBITING ARTISTS
Larry Achiampong, Valerie Asiimwe Amani, Dijay Blaki, Samson Kambalu, Gertrude Malizeni, Mervki Rep, DJ Seche, ft. Ala Praxis and (artist in residence) Tako Taal.
ABOUT ART EXCHANGE: MOVING IMAGE
The Art Exchange: Moving Image programme is a collaborative and cross-cultural curatorial professional development and exhibition programme for early to mid-career visual arts curators from Sub-Saharan Africa working with moving image. The programme is supported by the British Council and organised by LUX, the UK agency for the support and promotion of artists working with moving image, Yinka Shonibare Foundation and Guest Artists Space (G.A.S.) Foundation, Nigeria.