Priscilla Kennedy Ghana, b. 1994

Priscilla Kennedy expands the ways our bodies are knitted with the bodies of not only fabrics, but geological and historical maps, mythical creatures, data, fables, light etc; in transforming complex notions of identity; requiring us to look beyond the obvious. Priscilla Kennedy’s work requires an anamorphic gaze or a shift in perspective, just like the iridescence of velvet in her work: Black is not necessarily black, the female nude is not just a nude, and the human is not just human.

In her recent works, the nude is a body to be distorted or mutated than to be constricted within what is only human. This has birthed the monstrosity of hybrids with animals and otherworldliness that informs her exploration of the female body as a space for creative exploration and strange imaginations. Even in the process of the photoshoots with female models, she asks how to posture like that of a wall gecko or an octopus (-challenging the traditional postures expected from models in the commercial beauty industry). The nude in Priscilla Kennedy’s recent work is to move a step further from the human, though with some parts retained. To be further from ‘human’, which is reiterated in this text, is already explored in clothing and fashion: like mystical Zangbeto dancers in their straw costumes, Chiwara masks, Lil Nas X’s beaded skin at the 2023 Met Gala, Martin Margiela’s monster masks, or Rei Kawakubo deconstructive fashion which distorts the body other than elevating it to the ideal.