Echoes of Heritage: Two Artists Bringing African Legacy to Life at Royal Greenwich Festivals

On Saturday, August 1, 2026, Tramshed in Woolwich hosted Echoes of Heritage, an African Visual Art Exhibition and Creative Workshops as part of the ISE AGBE Festival at Royal Greenwich Festivals. The Mayor of the Royal Borough of Greenwich, Councillor David Gardner, attended the event, emphasising the significance of cultural initiatives that celebrate diversity, strengthen community engagement, and promote African artistic heritage in London’s vibrant cultural landscape.

Among the artists whose work filled the room, two stood out for their unique and strong approaches to the same question: what does it mean to carry tradition forward?
From photography that captures ceremony in action to textiles made from the same trash that the fashion industry discards, to portraiture that find dignity in tasks that most of us overlook, here’s a deeper look at two of the artists behind Echoes of Heritage.

Hafizat Adegbile doesn’t just picture culture; she maintains it. The Nigerian-born visual artist and photographer base her work on a simple but vital idea: traditions, symbols, and spiritual systems that are at risk of extinction ought to be documented before they go. Her contribution to Echoes of Heritage, The Tiv Flair Series, focuses on the Tiv people of central Nigeria, an ethnic group recognised for its rich textile traditions and strong community identity. Her figures, captured in mid-dance and draped in Tiv’s trademark black-and-white woven fabric, do not pose but rather flow thru memory. Through colour, texture, and shape, the series becomes less a record and more of an invitation for viewers to feel the “enduring spirit woven into every garment.” Adegbile’s work has been shown across the UK at galleries including W3 Gallery, Glasgow Gallery of Photography, and Dark Peak Photo, and featured in publications such as OutsideLeftCulture, The Guardian, Tribune, and Flux Review.

Oreoluwa Ayoyimika Odufejo, often known as YÍÍMIIKÁ, creates textiles that highlight the fashion industry’s dilemma. His approach combines craft, culture, and sustainability, drawing inspiration from the Yoruba art of Àdìrẹ and reimagining it via a cyclical, waste-conscious lens. His creation “Y” (2023), constructed from recycled wax, reused dyes, and water-optimized processing on Funtua fabric, was conceived, in his words, out of tremendous dissatisfaction, but also a lot of optimism, while living through Nigeria’s chaotic post-COVID political time. The endless “Y” shapes stitched across the fabric are literally endless “whys” a refusal to stop questioning, because as he puts it, “curiosity isn’t passive; it’s the very backbone of how we learn, resist and grow.”

Alongside it sits Ìṣẹ́ Ọwọ́ (Hand-Work), 2021–2025 an installation of used foam stamps, the actual tools of his batik process, worn down through years of use. It’s a piece about the mess behind the finished garment, and about transition: a transitioning phase as we search for better and more sustainable options, one thread at a time. Now based in London, YÍÍMIIKÁ curated and executed his grant-funded exhibition and colloquium by Southlands Methodist Trust at the University of Roehampton, he also exhibited at the Bradford African Festival of Arts, Ecobank Àdìrẹ Lagos, and designed for the Annual Felabration Festival. His work is being featured in publications such as The Vanguard, The Big Great Green Week, Roehampton Primary Schools Partnership Newsletter and many more.

Various materials, various topics, but one clear thread: both artists are undertaking the modest, vital task of preserving a textile heritage, a way of moving, and a way of labouring before it is lost to history. That’s exactly a feeling Echoes of Heritage was designed to embody.
The exhibition is delivered by Our Heritage UK, supported by Arts Council England, the Mayor of London, Royal Greenwich Festivals, and the Royal Borough of Greenwich.