Victoria-Idongesit Udondian

Textile and installation artist Victoria-Idongesit Udondian addresses the effects of fashion waste on Ghanaian communities through her multidisciplinary project, Okrika Reclaimed: Ufokeyo (2025-2026). Collaborating with local communities in the Kantamanto Market, one of the largest secondhand clothing markets and a massive open-air dump for discarded clothes in Accra, Udondian made the market the subject of her work and a site of artistic intervention. Onsite engagements included workshops, cleanup efforts, and site-specific installations from repurposed textile waste. A significant component of Udondian’s work focuses on the kayayei, or “she who carries the burden.” Working as head porters, these women, many of whom have migrated to southern Ghana for work, carry the physical and metaphorical weight of the secondhand fashion trade on their heads every day. Udondian has constructed an expansive installation to represent the project. The umbrella is a central motif, functioning as each trader’s personal vendor station. Repurposed textiles and photographic prints from her time in Accra surround the umbrella, challenging us to address the global conversation on fashion waste at home and abroad.