In Q3 2025, my good friends at the National Gay and Lesbian Human Rights Commission commissioned (lol, yes, see what I did there?) me to create an art installation for their look book, Hatimaye, which you should absolutely get a copy of, by the way.
The book was being launched at the Upinde Awards, and small brag moment, I was a nominee in 2024. The brief was clear from the jump. Bold, colourful, unapologetic.
The idea behind the installation was simple but important. To take the stunning images from the Hatimaye look book and let them breathe outside the page. My brain immediately went to Alice in Wonderland, but African. Dreamlike. Playful. Slightly disorienting. Familiar, yet not.
I wanted people to enter the book.
Not just look at it.
Not just look at it.
An ethereal space where you step out of the noise of the event and into the world of Hatimaye, even if just for a few minutes.
The images were printed on two metre boards and arranged into a walk through maze. A space you did not just view, but moved through. Somewhere between curiosity and wonder. Somewhere you could get a little lost, safely.
My friends at the Commission christened the installation A-maze-ment, and I loved the name immediately. The concept evolved further. This had to be an installation that could live for one night. No fuss. No drama. No elaborate builds that require three days and divine intervention.
We had a brutal window, from 6.00 AM to 4.00 PM, to set everything up. Which meant every decision had to be practical without killing the magic. Lightweight. Modular. Quick to assemble. Quick to dismantle. Which, let me tell you, was no small feat.
What emerged was a temporary world. Built fast. Held briefly. And then gone. Exactly how moments like these often are.
Below are some images from A-maze-ment, a short lived maze that existed just long enough to do what it needed to do.
