COURAGE HUNKE | No Man Steps in the Same River Twice

Opening July 10: It’s easy to talk about change — less easy to see it, much harder still to grasp it. Courage Hunke, born in 2000 and based in Accra, takes this impossibility as an inspiration for his artistic practice. In his first European solo show, taking place at Galerie Judith Andreae in Bonn, he doesn’t just present works to look at — he builds surfaces that are already in motion. Like the river in Heraclitus’ famous paradox, which lends the exhibition its title, nothing in Hunke’s works is ever still: memory, material, meaning — all are in flux. No Man Steps in the Same River Twice, isn’t a theoretical gesture, nor a nostalgic note. It’s an urgent proposition.

While Hunke’s work draws from the streets, symbols, and textures of Accra, it resists the narrow lens of biography or geography. His city becomes any city. In his words, “the city is an archive of memories” — not a static place, but a living, layered text. Each work acts as a visual diary, but one with pages open to others. Viewers may find themselves navigating a personal cartography — with family photographs, drawn maps, and scraps of everyday life guiding the way. The materials Hunke uses in this process speak as loudly as the images themselves. His image carriers are not traditional canvases but “sandwiches”, as the artist calls them himself — layered composites of found paper and pressed single-use plastic bags gathered from the streets of Accra. These surfaces are both ground and metaphor: waste turned memory, refuse turned record. These sandwiches are his city — and his resistance to forgetting.

In a time when climate discourse is often dictated by the Global North, Hunke’s work reminds us of another uncomfortable paradox: Africa, which contributes least to global waste and emissions, bears their effects most acutely. The plastic bags embedded in his works are more than material — they are index and indictment. But his approach is never didactic. This is not about guilt; it’s about witnessing. Hunke belongs to a generation of Ghanaian artists confidently shaping their own narratives. Inspired, among others, by Amoako Boafo — a pathbreaker who has built spaces and platforms for emerging artists — Hunke steps forward with his own voice: unafraid, unfixed, and unbothered by the usual expectations. His visual language is strikingly contemporary. The compositions could be album covers, streetwear campaigns, murals — and yet, they hold the weight of archives. They are stylish without being performative; authentic without explanation. In a world obsessed with authenticity, Hunke’s works don’t claim it — they embody it. This is not about packaging African-ness as exotic capital. Hunke’s practice doesn’t conform to that market demand. Instead, it shifts the frame entirely: he doesn’t ask to be seen, he shows — and in doing so, makes us see differently.

For his solo exhibition at Galerie Judith Andreae, Courage Hunke presents new works from his ongoing collage series, alongside a site-specific installation developed especially for the show. Constructed from cardboard and paper, the work echoes the corrugated metal fences commonly found at construction sites in Accra — partitions meant to obscure, to delay visibility. Hunke, however, transforms this visual barrier into a surface of expression, echoing the idea that the story is told on the outside.No Man Steps in the Same River Twice marks a moment of transformation not only for the artist but also for Galerie Judith Andreae. As a new generation steps forward to shape the gallery’s future, its program, too, shifts — toward a broader, more inclusive understanding of “international.” This doesn’t mean ticking diversity boxes or spotlighting “the other.” It means accepting that art markets, like rivers, are no longer linear. They’re deltas — and places like Accra are not peripheries but vital, generative centers. To step into Hunke’s world is to understand that change isn’t coming — it’s already here.

Courage Hunke (b. 2000 in Ashaiman, Ghana) lives and works in Accra and is a member of the Artemartis collective. Founded in 2018, Artemartis is dedicated to the development and management of emerging visual artists from Ghana. In 2025, Hunke is participating in the dot.ateliers residency program, initiated by internationally renowned Ghanaian artist Amoako Boafo. Hunke's recent exhibitions include An Atlas of Resistance at Septieme Gallery in Paris (2025), Transcendent Earth at Affinity Gallery in Lagos (2024), and participation in the 1-54 Contemporary African Art Fair in London with ARTEMARTIS (2024). Previous projects include group shows in Accra, Athens, and London, reflecting a steadily expanding international presence.

COURAGE HUNKE | No Man Steps in the Same River Twice
July 11 — September 6, 2025