“Afrofuturism, is not a dream, look up” came to me after I completed Mother Gaia. Mother Gaia is an abstract landscape painting of South Africa’s Cape Peninsula, the mixed media painting delves into traditional ecological wisdom, and the generational impact when that knowledge is lost. The painting began in 2012 with a community research study abroad experience in South Africa. As the years passed, I felt called to layer and incorporate the depth from that experience onto a canvas.
As an International Nutrition student at University of Texas at Austin my study abroad experience was research within the culture, political, and nutrition landscapes of the country including visiting townships in South Africa, where I saw the beauty, resilience, and culture of the people. It also lingered in my mind, because in the same place where you’d see bright billboards of a crisp red soda can with a dew drop - you would see the corrugated iron shack skyline of the illegal houses filled with upwards of millions of inhabitants who lacked clean water, infrastructure, and food access.
In Mother Gaia, I incorporate an elder enshrined with silver foil and gold paint adorned with the wealth of plant medicine, food imagery, and trinkets of nature’s blessings. The generations that follow are presented in three columns, representing a time span of family and how their connection to land, self, history, and knowledge fades, just like the overlayed illustrations on transparent paper. The painting was completed in 2023 nearly a decade after it had begun. Written on the back is the phrase that was sparked by a decade of learning, living, and researching and observing systemic patterns.
 

































Untangling systems of an equity and creating solutions for present and future generations, while acknowledging cyclical and historical patterns requires an exploratory mindset to transcend disciplinary boundaries and synthesize innovation to create lasting sustainable solutions.
As a neourodiverse, public health educated, interdisciplinary artist, technologist, citizen scientist, futurist, and activist - I question, explore, imagine and dance between disciplines. In 2022, my interest sparked an exploration in space from string theory to space industry. In the dance of interconnected futures and possibilities, a question formed in the simplest hope: How can we learn from our past and create a better future?
To break unhealthy patterns on an individual to global level, we must tune in and atone to our lived truths and choose a wiser path that releases unconscious or conscious limiting patterns.
“Aftrofuturism isn’t a dream, look up” is a call to action. I am an observer, questioner, and ever curious mind and the patterns seem unmistakable to me.
On this planet humanity has existed upon is a convoluted, complex, and uniquely supported species that sees itself separate to the Earth - disconnected- and from each other by lines of color, class, geographies, religion, age, and all our intersectionalities, personalities, and idiosyncrasies. If we do not wish to perpetuate the past and desire a future marked in its antithesis, then we would be welcoming inclusivity, restorative and circular economies, original models of industry, and practice, and a society that celebrates diversity in its multifaceted forms.
In 2024, our technological advances mean that our industries, habitats, and every facet of society are presently changing by a multitude of influences, namely artificial intelligence, social networks and ecosystems, decentralized tech and industry models, systemic shifts in incentive drivers and power, and Earth’s polycrisis.
All of these influences are also impacting the current ‘space race’. The space race that has sprung conversations and choices on interplanetary futures where habitats on planets, moon mining, orbital industries, and spaceship design are taking place now. If the current patterns of unequal awareness, access, and power continue to unfold due in-part to the nature of one trying to survive, heal, and overcome, generational and present day racism, marginalization, class segregation, geographical access points of food, health, education and economics, which is reflected in social determinants of health research. Well, who do you think will shape the future and the planets we’re attempting to explore and live upon?
My work as an artist is rooted in artivism - art and activism. My work as a social impact founder through Virtual Oasis Tech is to advance planetary health. Underlying these both is my personal mission to create art, design, innovation, and honor life’s spectrum of diversity, from plants to people. I believe just as the neural diversity of minds are of benefit to society, so we are all ethnicities, cultures and people. Like the Ubuntu philosophy and Baháʼí Faith saying, we are “one planet, one people”. In the invitation in my work inspired by themes like solar punk and afrofuturism genres, explored through a creative fellowship through the Design Science Studio, is a narrative that invites us all to embody hope and collectively work towards a regenerative, sustainable, and more equitable future.
In the work, I’m creating across mediums, industries, and ambitious outcomes - I aspire to be a voice, creative, and innovator shaping the artistic, political, social, environmental, technological, and spiritual worlds during my precious existence. This is deeply rooted in my own lived experiences. As one who has overcome complex trauma through a curious journey of self healing, and has found my way back to not only a sense of purpose, but hope in a renewed sense of faith towards God, people, and the Earth we live upon. I did not look up in my own life until I had healed the many wounds I’d lost count of during years of disassociation, masking, and coping. To look up means you’re open to seeing beyond and inviting imagination to encapsulate your mind - not the troubles, worries, pains, and traumas you’ve known. At least that is what it has meant to me. So written on canvas and orange acrylic paint adjacent to a blue moon is a phrase, a call to action, and an invitation.
Afrofuturism isn’t a dream, look up.
A work unfolding from this phrase and creative collaboration with Lanecia A. Rouse will debut at Project Row Houses in Houston, Texas in February 2025. Now, you know the story behind the art, and I can’t wait to share what comes next.
With creativity and curiosity,
RYN DEL PAPA

Here’s the link to the article about Ryn Delpapa's artwork

Ryn Delpapa's artwork: https://www.ryndelpapa.com/mother-gaia