a demonstration (4/4/25)

"i am
i am

the most beautiful being
the most beautiful being

in all of existence
in all of existence

& that is not
& that is not

an imposition of my ego
an imposition of my ego

but instead
but instead

a recognition
a recognition

of the fact that i am perpetually in motion.
of the fact that i am perpetually in motion.

'homegirl 3000' is a project about making home on the road."

"homegirl 3000" is an experimental self-archival project by oluwafunke wanda that utilizes digital lo-fi production, archival audio sampling & layered live performance to explore grief, cross-generational identity & Black trans* resilience through immersive sonic storytelling. Kick-started by funding from Binghamton University's 2024 Summer Scholars & Arts Program, it has metastasized into a metacognitive mode of incubation focused on auto-ethnographic cultural (re)memory. While the project in its blossoming entirety is nonlinear and multi-modal, the particular method utilized in this showing is live performance.

Despite how wayward this project has become since that summer, I'm glad I am able to show a sliver of it here. Thank you so much to the now vagabond Praxis Project Space for the opportunity to showcase this. Special thanks goes out to Anna Warfield & Tajaih Robinson--for helping me launch a dream off the ground.

"homegirl 3000: a demonstration" was performed live in April 2025 as part of Praxis Project Space’s “Sister Outsider" exhibition. The performance consists of three tracks and an interlude:

  1. hail mary
    1. i95 innermission
  2. adam's apple
  3. next lyfe

For now, these tracks only exist amongst backlit alley demos and this recording. I plan to change this at some point during 2026--maybe. We'll see how the flowers end up blooming.

There's something to be said about the start of this performance and ritual. I think of bringing people into my world as a spell of sorts, one where different materials and intuitions cultivated over time can lend someone their own way of shaping reality into their image. I agree deeply with ismatu gwendolyn in that I think art (which is far too expansive to be considered just consumable object) is included within the realm of the magical. Anything that changes nature to externalize one's goals and/or ideals must be partly otherworldly, no?

I guess this is all to say that those opening words grew like incantation on me. They are activators that allow me to both become my fullest self(s) and transport you to where I've landed. Each song I weave is another me washing up on the shoreline, another attempt to (dis)order myself by separating a fresh rib from my side.

Audre Lorde been talk about this, how poetry is not a luxury precisely because it forces us to articulate what we actually envision and desire outside of the frameworks we're prescribed. Or in more erotic terms, the shit that actually gets us off. You ain't gonna find that out in health class or even just through routine practice; it takes intentional experimentation and reflection to figure out what you want touched, why, by whom, and for what purpose.

That is to say, this shit helps me keep one eye on earth and the other on whatever's next.