Tuli Mekondjo

In her first solo exhibition in Switzerland, Namibian artist Tuli Mekondjo (*1982) presents a practice and process in which history, materiality and spirituality are interwoven. Her works deal with Namibia's colonial past and its repercussions, still felt today – from cultural erasure and forced labour, to social trauma and fragmentation. 

At Kunsthalle Bern, Tuli Mekondjo presents a commissioned expansive installation exploring the European collections of ‘crafted children’, which in Western ethnography is called fertility dolls. Restoring fertility channels as a healing process and a way to connect with and honor her ancestors is central to Mekondjo’s engagement with her own biography. She recreates these ‘crafted children’ which served a symbolic purpose of a woman having offspring. Today they only exist in the collections of ethnographic museums.