“Daybreak is Near is a love letter to a city that has been a historical center of African power.”
“The project explores the idea of what it means to live in an ever modernizing urban space, how we as citizens are able to reclaim and re-experience the history of our cities, and the role that fashion plays in the idea of belonging. Throughout the project the subject moves through her city as a flaneur, exploring questions around urban spectatorship, class tensions, and gender divisions of the twenty-first-century African metropolis and grapples with the notions of modern alienation & the postmodern spectatorial gaze. The project draws inspiration from ancestral memory and attempts to show what it means to subvert cultural, social, and gender imaginaries in the Horn of Africa.” - Gouled Ahmed
“Staged in the infamous Piassa neighborhood of Addis Ababa, the project also grapples with the themes of gentrification, urban renewal, and the long lasting effects of displacement on communities tied to historic centers. The main figure poses in front of various structures throughout the series to commemorate and memorialize what may in the near future no longer exist. In this sense Daybreak is Near also serves as an archive, as a pathway for us to remember what once was, what may soon be gone.” - Excerpt from an artist statement by Stylist & Lead Collaborator, Gouled Ahmed
View full article and artist statement here via Unlabelled Magazine
Archival super 8 Film shot by Nadia Nourhussein, edited by Medina Mohammed, vocal arrangements by Edom
CREDITS