With her first exhibit in Scandinavia, French artist Josèfa Ntjam explores the history of slavery through micro-organisms

"Listening to our ancestors that keep whispering to us, through the humus of this perpetually unraveled soil, stories of love, stories of revolt, and, of course, those you'll ever hear. I'm just a part of the message."- Matter Gone Wild.

For her first-ever solo exhibition in Sweden, titled 'Futuristic Ancestry: Warping Matter and Space-time(s)', rising French artist Josèfa Ntjam has transformed the white walls of Fotografiska into an immersive, multimedia voyage through the Afro-diasporic stories untold: hers, theirs, and ours. With the visible contrast of historical fact and speculative fiction woven into each image, hung alongside 3D dioramas or the psychedelic video montage starring Ntjam's body, prose words, and voice, the exhibition is confrontational, evocative, and important. With a profound consideration for paying homage to "those that came before us," Ntjam takes an archival approach to visual storytelling, using collage as the basis of her work.

By sourcing bits and pieces from political and historical archives, digging into her familial archives and Cameroonian heritage, and layering them with African mythology, micro-organismal creatures, and sci-fi references, Ntjam's work "embodies a fluidity that is both metaphorical and literal in its manifestation, creating a dynamic interplay of hybrid forms and dialogues,” as Fotografiska notes. Ntjam uplifts the shared narratives of a colonialist past with her personal and present perceptions of the ongoing fight for liberation, with fragments of the future she hopes to inspire.

In an exclusive Vogue Scandinavia interview, Ntjam shares new insight into her work and the "microscopic" lens through which she intentionally explores culture, creativity, and the call for change. "I try to look at history through a microscope," Ntjam says. "My family is from Cameroon, and we have this huge history of resistance. When I learned about that, I also learned that there was a lot of silence about the history," she explains. "So I tried to look closer. I also think the microscope metaphor is accurate in my work, which is why I started working with microorganisms. I wanted to give meaning to microorganisms and thought of plankton in the bottom of the ocean and the water. I then got the sensation that plankton was how I wanted to speak about the history and the history of slavery – using plankton can carry some part of this missing part of history when enslaved people crossed the ocean."