At the Kipaji Lab (the Lab), we believe in possibility. A Google search reveals that possibility means: a state of being, a likelihood, a thing that may be chosen or done. During training at the Lab, visual storytellers go through a process we call, creative transformation, in which they unlock not only parts of their imagination never accessed before, but parts of their being previously unknown to them. This enables them not only to create new imaginative stories and defamiliarize familiar stories, but also to create new possibilities for their lives.
Former participant Judy N. says, “First of all, at the beginning of the class, we were taught about creating a possibility for myself. I created for myself the possibility of being—that helped me in my life, not only in the lab. I was able to apply that to my schoolwork. I was working on a project at school that was a challenge. I would remind myself, ‘I am the possibility of boldness and innovation.’” As a result, the school project was a success.
While we are definitely up to training visual storytellers to think, see, and create in fresh new ways, we’re also into helping them create new ways they can be in the world. To be on the leading edge of visual storytelling, the next generation of African storytellers, first must see possibilities in who they are and how they show up in the world.
Judy’s school project’s success occurred because she acted differently. When she created the possibility of her being “bold,” it wasn’t just an adjective that she was throwing out to make herself feel better. It was a way of being that she was tapping into. This way of being led to results in her performance. Perhaps being bold for Judy meant sharing an idea that she would not have shared before; maybe being bold meant offering feedback to her classmates, even though she would face pushback; or maybe being bold was simply staying up a little later to do a little more than what she would have normally done to get the project done. All those things are bold moves. And it is only through boldness that innovation is created. Ask any entrepreneur or inventor – they’ll tell you.
To be African storytellers on the leading edge, to be storytellers who are crafting new stories and reframing Africa in Africans’ imagination as well as the global imagination, one must be bold. One must be willing to confront taboo subjects, upend old tropes, challenge, and invent conventions. In short, one must strive for ways of storytelling that do not simply reflect, but rather create, the moment.
It takes something to declare yourself as a possibility – something to likely happen; a state of being a thing, chosen or done. Among the things it takes is confronting yourself and being honest about how fear, familial, and social expectations have stifled possibilities within you. Then, it takes the hard work of showing up and not being stopped by how you have been. With possibility at the centre of the creative process, the past does not matter. The past is where it belongs: the past.
At the Lab, we believe in possibility because we believe in the limitless potential of creatives. What possibilities do you want to create for yourself and your life?