Mostly Feeling Great

For the festival “Still Claiming Common Spaces,” Laro supported Samra as dramaturge for the lecture performance “Mostly Feeling Great.” Samra had been developing her WILL AND TESTAMENT across various performances before finally publishing it in 2025. The lecture is an extension of this work:

„So on this occasion I would like to share one of the performance that I have left to my loved ones and colleagues to complete in the event of my passing. If I am to drop dead in the middle of this lecture, I hope that you all will complete this performance.
The first ten minutes may be titled, „A huge toy house in which I control everything“ or „52 ways of falling asleep forever“. The first title is a solid instruction for a set designer and a crew of very capable technicians. I want sound and lighting to become an extension of my body’s articulations. Not an elegant DJ number (I love the club but don’t believe in DJ’ing - won’t get into it here) and not a provincial light show. Frantic and racing around. So overrun, so overtime that the choreography is drilled into the ground. At points it flops completely but it isn’t the audience’s job to know. The second title is a riff on an incomplete performance that I’ve left to friends in my will, the general outline is: […]“

Following Samra’s poetry lecture, Eric Otieno Sumba and Samra Mayanja held a conversation about how life speaks poetry—and how poetry, in turn, can reveal and inspire our actions in unexpected and offward ways.

Samra Mayanja is a London-based artist and writer. Her work examines the body’s illegibility and the absurdity of seeking what is inherently lost—specifically, a clown-like pursuit of the impossible. The theme of searching, futile yet hopeful, runs through her practice, which blends sexy-gone-sour slapstick and poetic monologues with tender vocalisations.

Eric Otieno Sumba is a writer, editor, and independent researcher with a background in social theory, political economy, postcolonial studies, and art criticism. He currently serves as editor (publication practices) at Haus der Kulturen der Welt (HKW) in Berlin. His work has been published in Contemporary And, Africa is a Country, Lolwe, The Guardian, Griotmag, Frieze, Texte zur Kunst, and Camera Austria, among others.

https://kampnagel.de/en/productions/still-claiming-discourse
https://samramayanja.hotglue.me/
https://goodpress.co.uk/products/my-will-and-testament-never-my-last-by-samra-mayanja
https://otienos.com/