Tsoku Maela – Caguwa IV, 2020

Caguwa (/… /Swahili, Rwanda • pronounced {Tcha-Ku-Wa}) refers to clothing and shoes donated and imported from Europe that have become a multi-million dollar second-hand industry on the African continent. The word means Choose, characterized by the insurmountable amount of clothes entering the market place where consumers can pick from the litter of unwanted garments from first world countries at a fraction of the original price. Even underwear.

Local textile industries have suffered from the growth of this second-hand clothing market, which has also had an adverse impact on local economies and livelihoods of many. Africa has once again become the dumping ground for Europe and the Americas’ waste, and generously so.

Inspired in part by a conversation with Rwandan designer Eli Gold, Maela uses the ideology of Caguwa and its consequences on the growth of Africa as a metaphor for our relationship with the environment and its implications on our well-being, spiritually, mentally and otherwise.