Yatreda

Yatreda (ያጥሬዳ) is a family collective of artists from Ethiopia, led by creative director Kiya Tadele. Rooted in tizita—a profound sense of nostalgia and longing for the past—their practice combines childhood memories, oral histories, and folk tales with the rich heritage and legends central to contemporary Ethiopian identity, inviting viewers to reflect on the cyclical nature of history.

Yatreda takes its name from two Amharic words meaning fence and debt. Kiya Tadele was nicknamed Yatreda as a child, after a woman predicted that boys would “climb and break the fence” to see her beauty. The collective adopted this name for their art project, which they film and photograph in their own front yard, with curious neighbours peering over the fence.

The collective is renowned for short video loops that resemble photographs coming to life. Filmed in slow motion with a fixed camera, each work captures subtle movements either of people or of elements — a flicker of wind, drifting incense, a glimmer of glass — while everything else remains still.

Yatreda’s two standout series are rooted in the rich diversity of traditions found across Ethiopia: Movement of the Ancsestors captures the essence of various regional dances; Strong Hair documents traditional hairstyles, honouring the labour and artistry embedded in hair culture. 

Deeply hands-on in their process, the collective builds their own world from the ground up: when the right props or costumes cannot be found in antique shops, they make them by hand, and often perform in the videos themselves.