Yatreda ያጥሬዳ: Let’s slow down time together

Load is proud to present the first European solo exhibition of Yatreda ያጥሬዳ, an Ethiopian family collective whose rise in the art world is nothing short of extraordinary. In a field where NFTs and digital art are often viewed with scepticism, Yatreda has become one of the rare examples of a genuinely transformative success story. In just four years, the collective has gone from minting their first works on Foundation to LACMA announcing the acquisition of four pieces — an almost unbelievable trajectory, particularly for a largely self-taught collective working outside conventional art-world structures.

Much of what defines Yatreda’s practice stems from their hands-on approach. They built their own camera rigs from whatever materials they could source; they sew historical costumes, construct props, and produce every element of their sets themselves. This level of involvement makes possible a remarkably coherent artistic vision — one that treats video art with the compositional care, emotional weight, and understanding of light normally associated with classical photography and cinema.

Their signature black-and-white loops, where figures move only slightly as if a photograph came to life, are grounded in meticulous research and infused with tizita, a profound sense of nostalgia central to Ethiopian cultural memory. Drawing on childhood stories, oral histories and collective rituals, Yatreda ያጥሬዳ creates works that bridge ancestral knowledge and digital innovation, offering a portrait of Ethiopia that is both intimate and monumental.

Load presents a focused survey of their most emblematic works, including Strong Hair, which documents the diversity and artistry of Ethiopian hairstyles and received the Award of Distinction at Prix Ars Electronica. Also featured is The End of Innocence from Adam and Hewan that reimagines the Genesis narrative by placing Ethiopia — and Africa more broadly — at the birthplace of humanity. The work introduced many of the themes that would define the collective’s later practice: origin, memory, moral tension and the quiet drama contained in stillness. 

Another work, My Land, 1896, captures the final moments of the Battle of Adwa, when Ethiopia defeated Italy’s invading colonial army and became the only African nation to resist colonisation on the battlefield. The loop shows a Black Ethiopian warrior delivering the final blow to a white Italian soldier — an image still rare and unsettling within dominant visual histories. Precisely because of this inversion, the work confronts colonial narratives head-on and insists on anti-colonial resistance as a central, not marginal, part of discourse.

The coffee you drink while running will disappear ሲሮጡ የጠጡት ቡና ሲሮጡ ይጠፋል, a single-take film reinterprets the Ethiopian coffee ceremony as a meditation on time. The work, first shown at Loop fair in 2025, proposes togetherness, rhythm, and embodied awareness as counter-models to introspective and extractive time.

With this exhibition, Load underscores a rare reality in contemporary art: when guided by rigour and conviction, digital tools can amplify voices long excluded from dominant narratives. Coinciding with Project A Black Planet: The Art and Culture of Pan-Africa at MACBA, the exhibition also marks the first chapter in Load’s long-term exploration of the African digital art scene.

Let’s slow down time together runs from 18 December 2025 to 14 February 2026 at Load gallery, Carrer de Llull 134, Barcelona, Spain.