Collin Sekajugo’s All on Her: Reflecting on How Africa’s Clean Water Scarcity Falls on the Shoulders of Its Women
Ugandan artist Collin Sekajugo creates collages out of repurposed materials such as textiles, paper, and polypropylene bags, which he collects from the streets of his hometown.
One particular series depicts women and girls carrying an overwhelming amount of jerrycans on their heads. These pieces portray Africa’s clean water scarcity and how arduous the task of collecting water is. Water collection is often placed on the shoulders of women and girls in the community, a heavy task that has them vulnerable to attacks from other men, disease, and wild animals. Hence, Sekajugo’s upcycled pieces help tell the stories of these women and, at the same time, advocate for equal access to clean water in Africa, reflecting the United Nations Sustainable Development Goal of Gender Equality, Clean Water and Sanitation, and Responsible Consumption and Production.
When speaking about one of his pieces of women carrying jerry cans of water, All On Her, in an interview with WaterAid, Sekajugo shared that he decided to create the piece as he found jerry cans to be an iconic and symbolic item that exists in African homes. According to him, communities use jerry cans to frequently trade consumer commodities and, especially, to fetch and store water should their houses have no immediate clean water source.
“I have grown to believe that a home without a jerrycanis unlivable,” shared Sekajugo in the interview.
A report published by the United Nations University Institute for Water Environment and Health (UNU-INWEH) on World Water Day 2022 found that 500 million people in 19 African nations are water insecure, further proving Sekajugo’s observations that jerry cans are indeed a part of everyday life in Africa.
As the piece's title and the piece’s canvas itself depict, the arduous and laborious task of fetching water from the nearest clean water source and bringing it home often falls on the shoulders of women and girls in African communities.
The 2023 first in-depth analysis of gender inequalities in drinking water, sanitation, and hygiene by UNICEF-WHO reports that in seven out of ten households, women and girls are responsible for fetching water. The report also went on to show how this practice exposes women and girls to harassment, violence, and injury during the long trips they make to fetch water. On top of which, they are already at risk of being exposed to diseases such as diarrhea and acute respiratory infections due to their lack of access to clean water and sanitation.
On average, it takes women and girls two and a half hours round trip to collect water for basic home needs. Making Sekajugo’s series of women and girls carrying an impossible amount of jerrycansof water on their heads that much more impactful, as it goes to show just how much women and girls are struggling to meet their basic human right of access to clean water.
In another of Sekajugo’s pieces, The Drinker, viewers are confronted with a stark antithesis. Here they are presented with a masculine figure, a man or a boy who is drinking directly out of a kettle as plastic cups are strewn around his feet. This piece presents another side to his series of women and girls carrying jerrycans of water. Here viewers are confronted with a masculine figure who is benefiting off of their labours and efforts; in fact, this figure is not only benefiting, they are relishing and wasting water. It serves as a metaphor for the critical and largely unnoticed sacrifices that women and girls make in order for their families to have access to clean water.