MARIAMA WƆ HA
Moses Adjei empowers the transformative potential of social sculpture in his new exhibition at Accra’s La Foundation for the Arts
In Ghana, social sculpture has emerged as a critical artistic approach, engaging questions of labour, migration, care, and collective survival through lived experience rather than form alone. Expanding art into social space, it treats everyday materials, relations, and systems as active sites of meaning. Mariama Wɔ Ha, a new show curated by Rania Odaymat−a founding member of the Beyond Collective and presented at La Foundation for the Arts (LAFA), situates Moses Adjei’s practice within this expanded field, foregrounding the human infrastructures that shape contemporary urban life through sculpture, textile, and mixed media.
The exhibition intertwines intimate personal history with vibrant social commentary across diverse multi-media works. Drawing from his childhood as an orphan in Sodom and Gomorrah, an informal settlement in Accra, Moses Adjei spotlights the lives of the Kayayei - women porters - whose strength and resilience challenge prevailing socio-economic marginalization. Central to this exhibition is a powerful act of recognition and reclamation. Reminiscent of the pioneer art theorist Joseph Beuy's revolutionary concept of social sculpture, where art transcends objects and embraces life as a creative process shaped by all, Adjei's work operates as a complex system of recognition, resistance, and restoration centered on Ghana's kayayei women and marginalized communities. Adjei's practice echoes this ethos this ethos through materials and methods that weave personal and communal histories into public consciousness. His signature series, Apawa Coins, transforms battered pans carried by kayayei- the iconic symbols of invisible labor- into monumental sculptural coins that bear hammered portraits of these women.
Beyond reimagining objects, Mariama Wɔ Ha operates as a participatory archive and social act, inviting audiences to witness stories often excluded from dominant narratives. Marketplace- Past and Present, a large-scale textile quilt constructed from recycled fabrics and garments, layers visual histories that blend traditional Ghanaian textile artistry with contemporary street aesthetics.
''What distinguishes Mariama Wɔ Ha within the discourse of social sculpture is its insistence on situated creativity grounded in local histories and materials, connecting global conceptual frameworks with specific socio-economic contexts. The exhibition embodies Joseph Beuy's axiom that everyone is an artist by centering those typically rendered invisible - kayeyei women, street children, informal laborers - as both subjects and co-creators of cultural memory and future imaginaries. This communal dimension challenges elitist notions of authorship and art's exclusivity, positioning creative labor as a shared, world-making process that redefines wealth as dignity, resilience, and collective survival''- curator Rania Odaymat explains.
"I exchange the used pans for new ones, then etch their faces into the old and worn an act of acknowledgement and preservation. I shape each surface with hammers and improvised chisels made from scavenged nails. The sound of metal striking metal recalls the rhythm of Sodom and Gomorrah, (an informal settlement in Accra,Ghana) - the clamor of mechanics, carpenters, scrap dealers, vulcanizers - injecting memory and labor into the skin of the sculpture'' - Adjei affirms.
In sum, the exhibition stands as a compelling example of social sculpture's potential to catalyze sustainable futures.. Moses Adjei transforms narratives of poverty and exclusion into affirmations of shared humanity, inviting audiences to participate in a collective project where dignity- reclaimed, commemorated, and redefined- emerges as the true currency of wealth.
Mariama Wɔ Ha is on view at La Foundation For The Arts (LAFA) until February 11, 2026. All images courtesy of the Beyond Collective, La Foundation For The Arts (LAFA) and the artist. Photos of Exhibition works and Portrait of the artist by Francis Kokoroko
Moses Adjei empowers the transformative potential of social sculpture in his new exhibition at Accra’s La Foundation for the Arts
In Ghana, social sculpture has emerged as a critical artistic approach, engaging questions of labour, migration, care, and collective survival through lived experience rather than form alone. Expanding art into social space, it treats everyday materials, relations, and systems as active sites of meaning. Mariama Wɔ Ha, a new show curated by Rania Odaymat−a founding member of the Beyond Collective and presented at La Foundation for the Arts (LAFA), situates Moses Adjei’s practice within this expanded field, foregrounding the human infrastructures that shape contemporary urban life through sculpture, textile, and mixed media.
The exhibition intertwines intimate personal history with vibrant social commentary across diverse multi-media works. Drawing from his childhood as an orphan in Sodom and Gomorrah, an informal settlement in Accra, Moses Adjei spotlights the lives of the Kayayei - women porters - whose strength and resilience challenge prevailing socio-economic marginalization. Central to this exhibition is a powerful act of recognition and reclamation. Reminiscent of the pioneer art theorist Joseph Beuy's revolutionary concept of social sculpture, where art transcends objects and embraces life as a creative process shaped by all, Adjei's work operates as a complex system of recognition, resistance, and restoration centered on Ghana's kayayei women and marginalized communities. Adjei's practice echoes this ethos this ethos through materials and methods that weave personal and communal histories into public consciousness. His signature series, Apawa Coins, transforms battered pans carried by kayayei- the iconic symbols of invisible labor- into monumental sculptural coins that bear hammered portraits of these women.
Beyond reimagining objects, Mariama Wɔ Ha operates as a participatory archive and social act, inviting audiences to witness stories often excluded from dominant narratives. Marketplace- Past and Present, a large-scale textile quilt constructed from recycled fabrics and garments, layers visual histories that blend traditional Ghanaian textile artistry with contemporary street aesthetics.
''What distinguishes Mariama Wɔ Ha within the discourse of social sculpture is its insistence on situated creativity grounded in local histories and materials, connecting global conceptual frameworks with specific socio-economic contexts. The exhibition embodies Joseph Beuy's axiom that everyone is an artist by centering those typically rendered invisible - kayeyei women, street children, informal laborers - as both subjects and co-creators of cultural memory and future imaginaries. This communal dimension challenges elitist notions of authorship and art's exclusivity, positioning creative labor as a shared, world-making process that redefines wealth as dignity, resilience, and collective survival''- curator Rania Odaymat explains.
In sum, the exhibition stands as a compelling example of social sculpture's potential to catalyze sustainable futures.. Moses Adjei transforms narratives of poverty and exclusion into affirmations of shared humanity, inviting audiences to participate in a collective project where dignity- reclaimed, commemorated, and redefined- emerges as the true currency of wealth.
"I exchange the used pans for new ones, then etch their faces into the old and worn an act of acknowledgement and preservation. I shape each surface with hammers and improvised chisels made from scavenged nails. The sound of metal striking metal recalls the rhythm of Sodom and Gomorrah, (an informal settlement in Accra,Ghana) - the clamor of mechanics, carpenters, scrap dealers, vulcanizers - injecting memory and labor into the skin of the sculpture'' - Adjei affirms.
Mariama Wɔ Ha is on view at La Foundation For The Arts (LAFA) until February 11, 2026. All images courtesy of the Beyond Collective, La Foundation For The Arts (LAFA) and the artist. Photos of Exhibition works and Portrait of the artist by Francis Kokoroko