A zine created to reimagine the radical nineties magazine 2nd Generation
As a member of the vast diaspora of second-generation immigrants from the various colonies of the British Empire in the UK, finding a magazine titled 2nd Generation, created by prolific journalist, Imran Khan, from the 1990s touched me with resounding force. Not only that but it was cool. Cool, a word that is rendered utterly “uncool” as soon as you use it, but to me there is no other word to describe my initial reaction. The first time I came across this pioneering title were the covers of two early issues from 1997.
On each one a Brown female model poses moodily, swathed in Union Jack attire, ever present during this moment of ‘Cool Britannia’ in the ‘90s. Far from cliche, as the image of Ginger Spice in the Union Jack dress has become, the jarring contrast of a Brown model in what has become clothing reminiscent of various British groups from mods, to the fascist BNP or EDL, to skinheads, to punks. These images themselves sent me down a rabbit hole of research on the lives of these second-generation immigrants who assertedly fought to represent their mixed identities and cultures, during a time supposedly celebrating the ‘multiculturalism’ of Britain, but was also tainted by a spike in racially motivated attacks (I am thinking of the murders of fifteen-year-old Rohit Duggal and eighteen-year-old Stephen Lawrence in 1993).
Whilst trying to discover what led to the creation of 2nd Generation, during this period, I was introduced to the Asian Underground movement. This term describes music that blends elements of Western underground music, the likes of drum and bass or jungle, and traditional South Asian music, but it can not be reduced merely to this description. To me the movement seems to capture a youthful force of rebellion, often led by music, that freed the children of immigrants from their realities of racism and oppression. This latter comment is perhaps overly negative and generalising, but given the experiences of immigrants of Asian, Caribbean , or African descent during this period I feel it holds some truth. Finally, Asian became cool (again with this word), in a world dominated by white and Black artists, the diaspora seemed to step out of their shadows.
As a second gen, to witness and try to experience through the text and images of this period, the celebration of my culture during the late 20th century was something I found hard to believe. Having been born in 2001, the year of 9/11 and a spike in racism towards not just Asians but anyone deemed ‘Other’ by Western standards, to get a sense of a time before then where our cultures had been celebrated came as a beautiful surprise. Despite its decline in the early 2000s, I feel that the movement from the ‘80s and ‘90s is being reborn with collectives like the Daytimers (who you’ll be hearing from later on), or, a personal favourite, MIA and the continued work of artists like DJ Ritu. This zine aims to capture this sense of, not just revival, but reimagination of celebrating our cultures in a way that is not merely tokenistic. To do so I have created an iteration of a manifesto, in its loosest terms, to capture the essence of my zine:
To represent the diasporic communities within the UK and counter stereotypical and diminishing portrayals of such groups.
To represent the children of immigrants, the children of the ethnically ‘other’.
To be a supportive arm, an extension, for those with transnational identities.
2.2 is a representation of the art, fashion, culture and thinking of the NOW, imbued with hopeful narratives for the future (through a decolonial framing).
First issue as Junior Editor for Boy.Brother.Friend (Issue 9, 2025)
A Conversation with Dozie Kanu: Artistic Liberation and the Power of the Everyday
Dozie Kanu is a multidisciplinary artist whose work explores the intersections of identity, culture, and materiality. Born in Houston to Nigerian parents, Dozie's upbringing navigated the complexities of multiple cultural identities. His art practice reflects this rich, hybrid heritage, delving into themes of Blackness, African diaspora, and the impact of global systems like capitalism and colonialism. Dozie's work has been described as “inherently disobedient and stubbornly slippery”, by re-contextualising mundane objects and exploring their histories, he pushes the boundaries of function and form.
Tashi:
I wanted to start by talking about how emotions play a part in your practice, especially given the focus of this issue, which is 'rage'.
Rage is such a loaded term—often perceived negatively, but it can also be a motivating force, a catalyst for change. How do you let your emotions, particularly rage, inform your work?
Dozie:
Yeah, I think moving to the countryside of Lisbon was probably one of the smartest decisions I could have made as an artist. I didn't realise it at the time, but I was able to distance myself from the group thinking that often happens in cities. In metropolitan spaces, there's a pressure to conform, to create in certain ways or to make work that speaks to specific issues. But being in Lisbon allowed me to look inward. That isolation, being by myself, allowed me to trust my own voice, my taste, and where my heart wanted to go with my work.
That isolation definitely sent me down these paths of rage—though not in a traditional, negative sense. It was more of a happy rage. I'd get excited about something I was discovering in my work, some breakthrough in expressing myself, but at the same time, there was a sort of frustration. Like, I had to push myself so far, take myself through these uncomfortable experiences, just to see what I could truly do. It felt like I was expressing myself out of vengeance—almost like a personal response to the forces of capitalism, or, more broadly, the oppressive structures of the world. There's a rage there, but it's constructive. It's an empowered kind of rage. It's a part of my self-actualization.
That's interesting—you talk about this rage being tied to self-actualization. Do you think part of the anger comes from having to strip away so much of your life, to isolate yourself in order to see who you are as an artist?
Yeah, exactly. I had to make so many sacrifices, put myself in uncomfortable situations, in order to really understand who I am. It's not easy to break away from everything, especially when you feel like you're constantly looking for validation. But I realised that I had to get comfortable being uncomfortable. How do you grow if you don't push yourself beyond the boundaries? It was almost a kind of rebellion against everything I had been taught about success, art, and the art world itself.
So, during your time in Lisbon, were you working mostly alone, or were you engaging with others in some way?
At first, I moved to Portugal with my girlfriend, but then we broke up. By the time 2020 hit, I was living alone in this kind of studio warehouse space that I turned into my living and working area. At one point, I got so isolated that I started overanalysing everything I did, even the smallest actions. It got to the point where I was recording myself just doing mundane things—sweeping the floor, moving objects around. It felt like I was performing for an audience, even though there wasn't one. It was a strange experience, to feel like every action I took was a performance.
That sounds almost like a kind of craving for human interaction, where you started creating an imaginary audience. Do you think that's part of it—this need to feel seen or heard?
Yeah, I think it got so intense that I actually enrolled in an independent study program in Lisbon—not because I needed to go back to school, but just so I could force myself to be around people for a few days a week. It was becoming too much to be alone all the time. It felt like things were getting a little unhinged, you know? I needed to reconnect with other people, just to stay grounded.
That's really good you were able to recognise that though and bring yourself out of that before it got too intense. Just shifting gears a bit I wanted to speak to you about your upbringing in the south, you grew up in Houston, Texas?
Yes and I would say growing up in the south, especially in Texas, it's a very racially charged existence, you're not really aware of it as a kid, but there are aspects of it that crept up on me slowly. That really rubbed me the wrong way and started to paint my views of how I was actually valued in the country. There was a particular moment, in my teen years, where it became necessary for me and a few of my friends to decide on weekends if we would go to a predominantly Black party or a predominantly white party. I just remember the Black parties being so alive and so much of a kind of letting loose, a letting go of a kind of expression that I'm still unpacking.
Something in particular is this idea of access to capital that's very prominent, and what that actually means for creativity, what that actually means for one's ability to produce. What's apparent to me now, is that it's possible to infuse within material culture the same level of intensity, the same level of unshackled creativity I could feel in these parties. This is what I think I'm trying to exemplify in my work, this proof of concept that de-materialised forms of expression aren't the only high achieving forms of expression for Black people. I'd say I have a privilege to that, because I have direct heritage to Nigeria. My parents are Nigerian immigrants, so that posed another heavy kind of confusion because, having a direct line to where you come from, but then growing up as a Black American, it creates a different kind of relationship to material.
I've read that your mom is a Londoner, did she grow up in London?
Yes she did!
So did that add a different sort of energy in the household too? Perhaps you didn't grow up in a typically African-American household?
Yeah, for sure. It actually made me a little bit more obsessive with Black culture because in order to feel a part of it, I had to know it. And in order to know it, I had to kind of study it, you know?
Right.
Because I wasn't getting it naturally at home, but then when you're outside and you're seeing and experiencing Black culture, your ears are perked up a little bit higher than everyone else's. Of course I would see music video channels like BET, MTV, anytime anything of that nature came on, like Black sitcoms, I was glued to the television. Just trying to soak up as much of it as possible, maybe somewhat in an attempt to not embarrass myself out in the real world by not knowing certain things. But I think a lot of it was that it's fascinating, in general, to see the way that Black people have persevered and still managed to exemplify so much resilience, courage, beauty—everything that we are told we don’t possess.
So moving from your childhood could we speak about your move to New York?
Sure, I moved to New York with a group of friends, we were in the mindset that we were gonna move to New York and all blow up super fast. We were so determined, wide-eyed and optimistic about what we were capable of. And... I'm not saying that was the wrong mentality, but we were hit with a reality check.
How so?
Within the first six months, I think I fell into a deep depression in New York. I realised holy shit I'm gonna have to really work my ass off. Nobody's about to serve this up to me. But every kid that moves to New York is the coolest kid at their high school. And,
You suddenly become a big fish in a small pond?
Yeah, now you're competing with all the cool kids across America and you realise you're not special.
That's tough. But then what were you doing in New York? Did you start in fashion?
Yeah, well, it shifted. So I moved to New York, and I really wanted to become a film director. But I was shy and not really a community leader type figure. So I sort of fell back, but I love set design. I love interiors, colour theory, design, architecture…
I kind of went into it blindly, because it wasn't a very common thing for someone at film school to be focused on. So quickly everybody saw me as the set design guy, production design guy, and I loved it. I worked on a few thesis films for students, and it branched out to other schools as well. Then I thought I could apply this to fashion show runways and I got a job working for a runway show production company in New York, and I thought that's what I wanted to do for a second. But then I got a job in an interior design studio, and I loved it. I would go and drop off samples at rich people's big Hamptons houses. But I think the real thing that shifted my focus was the interior design studio I worked at was located in Chelsea, New York, which is where all the art galleries are. So before and after work, I would go and see as many shows as I could and these are usually the hours that nobody would go. So it really felt like being in a church. It was something so holy, spiritual even, walking into these big spaces and seeing the big paintings and big sculptures. And it was always so quiet I could hear my footsteps, and then I'm confronted with trying to figure out what the artist is trying to say? I'm this twenty, twenty-one year old, and I'm just training myself to understand the idea of exhibition making. I think there was a certain point where I thought this is what I want to do, because it incorporates everything I was interested in and it can go into so many different directions. I'm so happy that, that happened to me because wow, fuck I'm doing what I always wanted to do.
Yeah, that is blessed. When you talk about creating the exhibitions, is this then leaning into your art practice of using found materials?
I would say the aspect of using found material is, on the one hand, a product of my lack of access to capital—to fully fabricate things from the beginning to the end. But also, I think it's a way to point to things within culture and to point to things within history. So I love that aspect of using found material because it allows for so many different readings of the work. But also, a lot of the time, which kind of goes underlooked, I'm just really attracted to forms. I'm trying to find forms that exist in this world that I viscerally gravitate towards, and then a lot of the conceptual aspects happen after I've already been sucked in by the object.
That's what I find really interesting about your work—is the different levels and readings that you allow people to have in the sculptures. You were talking earlier about your first experiences in a gallery and how they felt religious. To me, your practice of using found material and deconstructing it, creating different meanings for people, really links to Buddhist philosophy and specifically a key aspect of Buddhism that all objects have no inherent existence. Something that my Buddhist teacher says to help me understand this is an analogy: if you have a cup [holds up her mug] it's currently a vessel to drink from. If you throw it against the wall, it's suddenly shards of ceramic. It's still the same object, but the meaning is completely shifted. I can feel this in your work, do you feel that spiritual charge? Is that intentional?
That's exactly what I'm trying to channel, and that's exactly why I use functional aspects as a way to challenge whether or not this can be done. If I put a chair in this gallery, or if I put a table, or if I put something that's been made with the idea of a specific function in mind, am I able to then have someone divorce themselves from that function in their mind and see it as something else? Can I charge it enough that this chair no longer becomes a chair to you? And I think a large part of the reason why I feel so called to do something like that is because, when you think about African bowls and masks, they are often deemed as sculptures. But in African culture these were actually functional objects. So maybe it's a kind of reverse effect of when African objects enter the Western world, they're no longer tethered to their original function.
So there is a sense of taking back and shifting the viewer's perspective of the found objects in spaces where these objects are often mis-portrayed.
Okay so to close out the interview I wanted to break the fourth wall and ask what your opinions are on interviews? Do you think that they're a fruitful format for artists, because you can speak about your work and express how you want it to be conveyed, or do you think that the art should just be left to do the talking?
I get nervous in interviews, and as artists, in order for us to exist in this weird industry and manoeuvre forward we're expected to be extremely well equipped to promote our work. I struggle with doing that sometimes. So I really do want the work to be able to speak for itself, but I think increasingly we're asked to be these spokespersons for the work and speak eloquently and do all these panels and lectures. But I feel like it's really amazing when I'm able to speak candidly, like this, and I think I'm in a great position right now where I've been disenchanted by the art world. I'm no longer seeking the validation of anyone in this space. So I don't really feel like I can mess up, I'm not trying to gain anyone's respect who works in any of these institutions. I think it's going to become very apparent for artists that reaching people who come from outside the art world, those are the real people that you should be trying to reach. Those are the people that you should be trying to inspire. The academic class of the art world is not who moves the needle. It's a very small, insular group of people. If you actually want to affect change, I think you should be looking at the everyday man. So to answer your question, I feel much better about interviews than I did in the beginning. Let's just put it like that.