Acaye Kerunen

The title of the first solo exhibition dedicated to the work of Acaye Kerunen in the United Kingdom – Neena, aan uthii (See me, I am here; 15th January–22nd February 2025) – is an ode to the many women involved in the artist’s practice. At Pace Gallery, London, Kerunen’s new body of sculptures were elevated above the ground and suspended on walls or plinths, creating a direct confrontation with the viewer that demanded an acknowledgement of their presence. Her work is not only a tribute to her matrilineal lineage – from whom she learned the skills of embroidery, weaving, folding, coiling, sewing and assemblage – but also to the female artisans who supply the materials that are integral to her practice, such as palm leaves, sorghum and millet stems, sisal, raffia palm, grass, banana fibre and rinds and bark cloth. Neena, aan uthii compelled viewers to acknowledge these women, who have struggled to find a location for their craft market in Kampala and whose livelihoods are under threat from the structures of patrilineal land ownership and monoculture farming. More widely, the exhibition title suggests the invisible domestic labour performed by women that maintains the operations of everyday life, most often for others.

While Kerunen borrows from the techniques and materials preserved by female artisans, she simultaneously dismantles the utilitarian purpose of their products. In her sculptures, the women’s wares, including baskets, textiles and sun hats, are rendered functionless. Through this transformation, Kerunen challenges the instrumentalisation of women’s labour and proposes a kind of liberation premised on creativity and the ability to dream. She previously explored these ideas in the installation Ayelele, which was presented in the group exhibition Unravel: The Power and Politics of Textiles Art at Barbican Art Gallery, London, in 2024. (opens in a new window) 1 Ayelele is created out of raffia, stripped banana fibre, palm leaves and sisal, woven and knotted together and suspended from the ceiling. The work title plays with the possibilities of craft, referring to both a sound of elation and joy but also a cry for help. In this interview, Gabriella Nugent spoke with Kerunen about her practice, the specific context from which it emerges and the women who sustain it.

Gabriella Nugent

How did you prepare for your exhibition Neena, aan uthii?

Acaye Kerunen

All in all, the show was around two years in the making. I hardly ever sketch, not because I can’t, but because it’s something that was shamed out of me. Because I never drew in straight lines. I never coloured within the lines. I wasn’t able to draw concise conventional shapes. At the time, when I was in school and I took art for a bit, that was like the Holy Grail of being chased away. Eventually just the shame of not fitting in got me out.

What that means for my practice now is that I have these ideas in my head. I sit with them for a very long time. Sometimes I'll take random pictures of a street corner or of the way the light is playing on a plant or the sunshine outside, or I’ll be listening to music and these shapes, colours and forms will be playing my head. When I said I’d been thinking about the show for two years, it was all these things. I knew the colour patterns I wanted to deal with. I knew the makers I wanted to work with. I knew the materials I wanted and which dyes. This sat with me for a very long time. And then the landscapes of the works were on my wall for a very long time. I would just sit and stare at them. If there was an AI-generated cypher or something, it would be crazy to see what’s running around in my mind in those moments. And then between those moments is the courage to actually start the work, to touch the material and start appending them in right ways.

GN

I want to ask about the techniques that are central to Neena, aan uthii and your work more generally, which include embroidery, weaving, folding, coiling, sewing and assemblage. Where did you first encounter them?

AK

In my childhood. My mum is very much a part of my practice, and my extended family – aunties and everything. The biggest school, and most intense education and learning that I received, was from observing them.

My practice – the knots, the appendages, the braiding, plaiting and especially the stitching – is a meditation and management of challenges, but also a way of finding a path towards liberation. A lot of these processes are about charting new paths – new paths that I feel in my skin and my blood, but sometimes, the words to articulate them are blurry. When I touch these materials and I start to work with them, the way starts to reveal itself. Being that it’s mostly a solitary, and lonely, practice between my head and the material I’m working with, that’s easy, because I don’t owe anyone an explanation.

(opens in a new window) Continue reading at burlington.org.uk.