Hakeem Adam presented by Emeka Ogboh
“A Moment in Passing”, 2023
Mirrored cube, sound installation
Underpass between Heinestraße and Friedrichstraße
Daily
Video: Hakeem Adam presented by Emeka Ogboh – Visit to Monheim am Rhein
With the expansive installation "A Moment in Passing" in the pedestrian underpass between Heinestrasse and Friedrichstrasse, Hakeem Adam focused on the urban situation in Monheim as a place of natural movement and potential (self-)encounters between people.
The underpass between Heinestraße and Friedrichstraße is a typical urban transit space that has led pedestrians from the Berliner Viertel to the (new) Mitte in Monheim am Rhein and in the opposite direction since the late 1970s. A decade earlier, the Berliner Viertel had sprouted up as a large housing estate in a very short time and was viewed critically by some residents, as the project heralded the transformation into a city, a rapid increase in population and enormous modernization. As a typical “non-site,” the tunnel is characterized by movement, fleetingness, but also changeability, and aroused the interest of the Ghanaian artist Hakeem Adam.
While the Berliner Ring appears to be a borderline between neighborhoods, the underpass not only supports pedestrian mobility but, in Adam’s view, can also naturally foster connections.
As part of the sound art exhibition The Sound, the movement of passers-by was acoustically amplified and made audible in the pedestrian underpass by the directional sound of the loudspeaker boxes. On the other hand, Adam enabled a surprising moment of pause in the tunnel: the artist installed a mirror block there, allowing the viewers to become part of the artwork and also of the urban situation.
Biography
Hakeem Adam completed the Master’s programme “Digital Media” at the Hochschule der Künste in Bremen. This year he is a laureate of the 2023 Award for Creative Technology at the STRP Festival 2023 in Eindhoven. He is the founder and artistic director of Dandano, a pan-African cultural platform for African film and music criticism and documentary.
Adam was nominated for The Sound by Berlin-based Nigerian artist Emeka Ogboh. Ogboh’s interest is in the ubiquity of sound, which he examines for its material and audible qualities. His work explores how memories and stories can be translated into sound and installations, and addresses issues of migration and globalization. Ogboh has exhibited at documenta 14 (2017), Skulptur Projekte Münster (2017), the 56th edition of La Biennale di Venezia (2015), and the Dakar Biennale (2014), among others.
