HOW WE DO | Afreetekture

HOW WE DO

Object cluster 01//

Name: Sekgotlokotlo sa puo

Meaning: Fragment/tool of speech

Function: Marks the break in language

"WE BEGIN BY MAPPING A SYMBOLIC TERRAIN, A FIELD OF ACTORS, STRUCTURES, MEANINGS, AND RELATIONSHIPS. INTO THIS FIELD, WE INTRODUCE RITUAL ARTEFACTS, SCULPTURAL FORMS THAT HOLD POTENTIAL FOR MEANING. THE OBJECTS DISRUPT, DISTURB, OR RECONFIGURE THE FIELD, INVITING NEW QUESTIONS, CONNECTIONS, AND INSIGHTS. THROUGH DIALOGUE, MOVEMENT, AND REFLECTION, WE TRACE THE EMERGENCE OF NEW PATTERNS."

Dr Sechaba Maape 2025

Object cluster 01//

Name: Sekgotlokotlo sa puo

Meaning: Fragment/tool of speech

Function: Marks the break in language

EVOLUTION OF THE ARTEFACTS

The symbolic artefacts I work with today have evolved over time as tools for reconfiguring frameworks and shifting meaning. Their origins trace back to my 2017 PhD, where I studied ritual practice in my hometown of Kuruman. The question was whether it was possible to create objects that could participate in the dissolution of dominant frameworks, while simultaneously pointing toward alternative ways of seeing and being.

These early explorations were shaped through close engagement with indigenous practitioners from the Kuruman region, whose practices of artefact-making became a crucial reference point. Around the same time, I had the rare opportunity to encounter the work of Credo Mutwa, whose handmade symbolic forms, created while he lived in Kuruman with his wife Virginia Mutwa (a relative of mine), deeply influenced my thinking.

While the artefact I made for my PhD was not a central feature of the dissertation itself, it became, over time, the most enduring and generative outcome of the research. Since then, I have continued to develop this practice, refining the objects and the processes surrounding them as instruments for unlocking meaning, transforming perception, and building new symbolic worlds.

Object cluster 01//

Name: Sekgotlokotlo sa puo

Meaning: Fragment/tool of speech

Function: Marks the break in language

SOURCE CODE

Over the years, these artefacts have evolved into a kind of symbolic source code, tools I use to shift perception, unsettle assumptions, and reframe meaning. I deploy them in a range of contexts: as prompts in AI systems, as catalytic objects in workshops and seminars, as conceptual spring boards for architectural design projects, and as instruments within ritual practice. Each artefact emerges through an intense creative process, often beginning with painting, sculpting, or drawing, and gradually takes on a life of its own, becoming more than just a form: an active participant in a process of transformation.

Crucial to their development is my ongoing engagement with indigenous knowledge systems and the specific contexts in which they are practiced. This includes visiting sacred sites, spending time with traditional knowledge holders, and immersing myself in the spiritual and ecological logics of place. These encounters sharpen my capacity to develop artefacts not as detached symbols, but as living embodiments of a deeper grammar, rooted in cosmology, land, and ancestral knowing.

Object cluster 01//

Name: Sekgotlokotlo sa puo

Meaning: Fragment/tool of speech

Function: Marks the break in language

The concept of terrain in my work emerged through years of engaging the ritual landscapes of my hometown, Kuruman. Studying sacred sites, climate patterns, and indigenous knowledge systems, I came to see the land not as static backdrop, but as animated, alive with forces, presences, and meaning.

Through drawing experiments, I visualised this terrain as a field of dynamic relations: winds, rocks, rituals, and absences all interacting. Certain sites, ritual voids, stood apart as ontological thresholds, where meaning dissolved and reformed. These were not just locations, but portals to other ways of being.

This foundational insight now informs how I read all systems, organisational, technological, architectural, as terrains. Each is a living field, structured by power, potential, and perception. My current work uses artefacts and symbolic tools to navigate and reconfigure these terrains, opening space for new worlds to emerge.