AfroQueer

Homeless Hungry Homo comments on how gay Africans are . . . oftentimes more likely to end up in poverty because of the dual criminalization and demonization of same-sex love, by the government and the church respectively. It also comments on the fear of poverty as a result of coming out, and the notion that people will choose to remain “masked” and in the closet for that reason.
— Adejoke Tugbiyele

Tragically, the sort of binary-free, autonomous space artists like Jacolby Satterwhite celebrate is not always available, particularly in parts of contemporary Africa. Adejoke Tugbiyele’s art advocates for richer and more humane understandings of identity and status, particularly with regard to sexual orientation.

Here, Tugbiyele takes discarded and low-value materials, including palm stems, and weaves them into a figure imbued with the colors of the gay pride flag. At the same time, the figure sits in a gesture that evokes a life lived on the streets and wears a mask to conceal the subject’s identity.