Hybrid Eyes

East African VJs translate foreign films into local languages, taking the liberty of entertaining their audience with their own interpretation of the films. Esther Mugambi acts as this sort of VJ, mediating the visual imagery and the subtext as it shifts about and adding her own commentary to splice reality and fiction.

Mugambi grew up in Kenya, then moved to Australia and later to the Netherlands, developing a chameleon-like ability to adapt to many environments. For this project, she endeavours to become the other, imagining the life she might have had if she had stayed in Kenya. Playing with the fickleness of memory, she creates a world that comments sharply on a country that has come into focus recently thanks to Obama’s heritage and the violence following its presidential elections.