Dot.ateliers, the artist residency based by Amoako Boafo in 2022, grew from a private want for the inventive area and neighborhood he had wished for earlier in his profession. Now, the Ghanaian artist tells The Artwork Newspaper, his newest undertaking “comes from that very same area of reflection, however this time by way of my love for tennis”.
Located on a decent plot in Osu, the neighbourhood in Ghana’s capital, Accra, the place Boafo was born and raised, Yard Neighborhood Membership homes a tennis coaching facility described because the nation’s first regulation clay courtroom. It’s a undertaking that’s definitely pricey to Boafo’s coronary heart. Earlier than changing into a worldwide artwork sensation he was a ball boy after which a tennis participant, and his work options fellow gamers.
Self-expression
“With Yard, I hope to create that sort of setting for younger folks, an area the place sport isn’t nearly competitors however about confidence, connection and self-expression,” the artist explains. “It’s a technique to remind them that the courtroom, just like the studio, generally is a place of creativity and development.”
Designed by the Accra-based structure agency DeRoche Tasks, Yard affords an answer to the customarily scarce public leisure areas for younger folks by providing free classes to kids in the neighborhood. The agency’s founder and chief, Glenn DeRoche, describes the area as intentionally open-ended.
Rammed-earth first
The tennis courtroom is surrounded by a four-metre-high wall of precast rammed-earth panels—the primary within the nation, based on DeRoche’ Tasks—and incorporates a shaded, built-in bench and altering rooms. Bushes and crops equivalent to coconut, peppermint, soursop, mango, lemongrass and guava develop all through and across the area, offering diet for the younger individuals who play there.
“Yard is about greater than tennis. It’s about making a platform for youth, for mentorship and for neighborhood,” says DeRoche, the undertaking’s inventive director and Boafo’s frequent collaborator. “If even just a few gamers are in a position to take what they’ve discovered right here and step into international competitions or management roles in their very own communities, then we’ve accomplished one thing significant.”
Boafo and DeRoche collaborated on the artist’s first solo exhibition in Asia at Wooyang Artwork Museum in South Korea, and on his first European and UK solo exhibits at Belvedere Museum in Vienna and Gagosian in London. DeRoche additionally co-designed dot.ateliers’ Ogbojo Residency in Accra, which was the editor’s decide in The Architect Newspaper’s 2024 Greatest in Design Awards.
