WHEN LIONS LEARN TO SWIM

Kalkidan Hoex, a jewelry artist from Ethiopia, creates a collection called When Lions Learn to Swim, which explores her identity and experiences in a third world. She moved to the Netherlands from Ethiopia as a two-year-old, causing friction and adaptation in her identity and cultural background. The collection reflects her in-between world, highlighting the in-between world where frictions in identity and adaptation occurred. Kalkidan's experience as part of the StimuleringsFund allowed her to step back and reevaluate her practice, learning new techniques and traveling to Ethiopia. She compared her work to western art and Ethiopian art, focusing on the reasoning behind making and the importance of the maker's story. The collection combines wearable and conceptual jewelry with photography and moving images, reflecting the complexity of Ethiopian culture and mindset. The collection is an installation that combines jewelry with photography, textiles, and moving images, showing the realm where this blur of worlds exits.

When lions learn to swim is first and mostly symbolical to my first memories a child in Ethiopia and adoption to The Netherlands. One of these stories goes like this:
I remember slee rides seeing ice everywhere, cold feet in my red rubber boots with thick socks. My afro under a cap that could barely contain my afro, a scarf around my neck up to my nose at 4 years old. I didn’t like all this ice and didn’t understand the joy of playing in the cold. I cried and screamed until my Dutch mother took me inside the cafe with a hot coco. I watched through the window how other children would play. One of my first feelings of how I felt like I didn’t belong here but growing grew and adapted to the culture my parents wanted to give me.

This also happend at the start of my swimming lessons. I learned that in a land with so much water everybody swims. and going to swimming lessons was normal. I as quite good at it as well and started to love to swim. I always considered myself as the Ethiopian lion bron from the dry lands that learned to swim. Learned to survive, to adapted and how I found healing in my frictions.