Finding EKAS.
Working with the invisible to design a brand marketplace run on the underlying logic of Re-humanisation and autonomy
In “Finding EKAS,” Esther Kehinde Ajayi invites us on a journey of exploration and research that spans economics, psychology, the philosophy of space intersecting race, class and humanity. She unveils the fundamental logic and philosophies that inform her sound practice as she moves forward. When she encountered a quote from Henri Lefebvre’s “The Production of Space,” which explained how the ‘elites’ utilize a system by leveraging their technical expertise and understanding of its underlying logic in relation to space to maintain hegemony, Esther was inspired by a new perspective: “We live in an ecology of systems.” Some of these systems have been designed to use us and some are within our reach, allowing us to use them to our advantage or detriment.
Considering the concept of the one and only “big bad” System, which we are constantly at the mercy of, as a myth of powerlessness, a cultural technology designed to play right into the underlying logic of systems of dehumanisation and spread its values, Esther Kehinde Ajayi considers the sound-based systems she has access to via her expert knowledge, technical expertise and agency, to try how she can use those systems on the basis of the underlying logic of re-humanisation to carefully design, frame and trade sonic cultural technologies, the invisible, to debunk myths of powerlessness concerning race, class, self-concept and more.
Referring to a study of Nazi propaganda and the ‘denial of mind’ as well as a recent study of states of persistent low-income in Britain, in finding EKAS, Esther Kehinde Ajayi lays out the blueprint on how she will be using her sound practice to create brand new evidence of agency, beauty, autonomy and hope in service of a brand-new market, a marketplace of re-humanisation.
Bio
Esther Kehinde Ajayi is an interdisciplinary sound artist born 1996 in West London. She merges highly conceptual sound design with interactive technology and custom sound system design across film, sound, music, sculpture, installation and theatre formats. Since 2021, she has focused on sound design for London theatre, emphasising the spatial presentation of sound through hybrid systems that blend software, hardware, and visual elements. The hybrid nature of her work serves as a metaphor for collaboration among diverse groups, promoting innovative outcomes. By exploring the intersections of trade, sociology, and culture, her projects often result in sound art installations and performances, poetry, music and academia. She refers to her practice as sonic cultural technology design, highlighting sound as a psycho-cultural tool for personal empowerment and community well-being.
Photography by Abigail Ford
Bibliography
Henri Lefebvre, trans. Donald Nichols0n-Smith, The Production of Space, (Oxford: Blackwell, 2017)
Herman Narula,Virtual Society: (New York: Currency, 2022)
Oyèrónké Oyěwùmí, The Invention of Women: Making an African Sense of Western Gender Discourses (University of Minnesota Press: Minneapolis, 2016)
Olúfẹ́mi Táíwò, Against decolonisation: Taking African Sgency Seriously, (C Hurst and Co: London, 2022)
Mark Casson, John S. Lee, ‘The Origin and Development of Markets: A Business History Perspective’, Business History Review, 85 (1), (2011), pp. 9–37
Alexander Landry, Kayla Mere, Ram I. Orr, Dehumanization and mass violence: A study of mental state language in Nazi propaganda (1927-1945) [Preprint, 2021]. doi:10.31234/osf.io/7w2vk.
Compulsive Under Earning – An Ambivalence About Success: Paul Sunderland: Tedxsurreyuniversity (2016)
Haiti, Africa and the Global Dynamics of Race – a conversation with Jemima Pierre (2023)