#36: This is us

We create value. We believe in the work of our hands. We use local resources to serve local communities. We imagine experiences and design possibilities. We work together. We celebrate what we have and create what we don’t have. We are proud of our products. We are proud of our people. We are proud of our nation. THIS IS US™

I’ve been talking to more artist-friends *— Aisha and Serine, Oroma and Osione, Nwando and Fatu, Funmbi— about wuruwuru, and whew, artists get it. Not only do they get it, but they’ve been living and doing it for years. Through them, I’m discovering a higher purpose for wuruwuru.

wuruwuru is for me today what Paystack was for Shola six years ago. What Shola did right (and still does amazingly) is that he saw the vision, found the people, brought us together, and gave us the tools to succeed. I’m going to do the same for wuruwuru but with a twist— we’ll operate as a startup but organise as a collective. I know how to do this now because I’ve spent the last year redesigning my team at Paystack for scale.

I first met Funmbi at the S16* short film festival last December, but we didn’t talk until last week. I wanted her to help complete production for Hanky Panky, but what I got was more than I hoped for. She understood the film instantly. She asked questions I hadn’t considered. She saw what it could be, more clearly than even me. She made a mission out of my experimental side project.

The excerpt at the beginning is from This is Us, a design and manufacturing company run by Oroma and Osione. I’ve been spending more time with them recently, and the amount of synergy we have is crazy. The foundations of our practice, our art and design sensibilities, the stories we want to tell are remarkably aligned. I don’t think it could have been scripted any better.

Just like Funmbi, they don’t just see what I’m doing, they see what I should be doing. For many years, people like this have been saying the same thing I realise I’m trying to say now: This is us. This is the best of us.

wuruwuru is an independent artist collective, and our mission is to build communities of practice, bear witness to the culture, tell new stories and promote new ideas.

Our projects are serendipitous — they all started from a random conversation with someone — but tie directly to these goals:

• The J Guide is about exploring new publishing formats and building an illustration/comics community.
• Cover Bank is about documenting the culture of album cover art and building a graphic design community.
• Hanky Panky is about documenting the process of independent animation in Nigeria and building a film community.
• Feel Good is about telling new stories and building a writing/publishing community. If you ask anyone at Paystack what the best thing is about working here, the answer you’re likely to get is “the people”. This answer is why the company cannot “fail” — because it doesn’t matter what happens to the business, we’ve made a community for life.

wuruwuru is about championing the best of Nigerian culture. It’s about people — finding them, bringing them together and providing the space and tools for them to make great art.

Links

• Oroma and Osione: This is Us, SLIDE
• Fumbi: Fatherland
• Nwando: Nalè, Visuals by Nalè
• Fatu: Big Tech This Week
• S16: Surreal16Collective