Karo Akpokiere works across drawing, design, and storytelling. Rooted in close observation of everyday experiences, his practice examines how symbols, typography, and graphic systems shape the ways personal and political narratives are constructed and understood.
For Akpokiere, every drawing holds a million lives, with these lives unlocked through collaboration and translated into various media, such as books, textiles, enamel sculptures, and posters, among others. This approach allows his work to exist in multiple contexts and become part of daily life.
His ongoing project, An Alternative History of Symbols and Their Meaning, reimagines the coats of arms of German federal states, cities, towns, and villages to depict a fictional nation grappling with its identity and institutional collapse. Through this speculative framework, he explores themes of appropriation, the production of meaning, reverse ethnology, and the role of fiction in shaping contemporary realities.
Akpokiere’s work has been presented internationally, including at the 17th Triennial of Tapestry, Łódź, the 20th Biennial Sesc_Videobrasil, São Paulo, and the 56th Venice Biennale. He has also collaborated with companies such as Moncler (Italy), Nike Europe, Google (San Francisco), and WeTransfer (Amsterdam)
Karo Akpokiere lives and works in Hamburg, Germany.
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