Walk with me is a dance piece that brings together creators from dance, visual art, sound art, and light art. The work builds on Ama Kyei’s earlier dance pieces for children, as well as the collaboration between Ama Kyei and Wanda Holopainen in Zodiak’s Good vibes east youth project.
The performance is a journey into a secret garden — a place where light and shadow meet inside a blanket fort. The performance is inspired by the text A Course in Miracles:

We were all meant to shine as children do.
It’s not just in some of us, it’s in everyone.
And, as we let our own light shine, we consciously give
other people permission to do the same.
As we are liberated from our fear,
our presence automatically liberates others.

Direction, choreography, performance, script: Ama Kyei
Set design, videos, artistic dialogue, script: Wanda Holopainen
Sound design, artistic dialogue: Saban Ramadani
2D animation, artistic dialogue: Naomi Holopainen
Lighting design, artistic dialogue: Titus Torniainen
Costumes: Albert Kingsley Annan & Angela Emanuel Mugisha
Knitted artworks on the set: Kirsi-Mari Hemanus
Dance on video: Steeze Afrika (Accra, Ghana)
Kpanlogo song: Ghana Dance Ensemble musicians (Accra, Ghana)
Song: Iida Valme
Outside Eyes: Marika Peura, Nadja Leham & Axelle Munezero
Co-production: URB festival / Kiasma Theatre & artists
Supported by: Arts Promotion Centre Finland, Zodiak Laboratory, Kone Foundation (Wanda Holopainen), Konstnärsnämnden (Ama Kyei)

Ama Kyei is a dancer, choreographer, and dance pedagogue whose heart beats for surrendering to freedom, for children, and for nature. Ama’s dance roots are in street dance, and in recent years she has delved into traditional West African dance traditions, mainly in her second home country, Ghana.

Wanda Holopainen is a multidisciplinary artist working with textile and video installations. Her artistic practice focuses on memory, archives, folklore, ancestral knowledge, and spirituality.

Naomi Holopainen’s conceptual work centers on lines, forms, and movement across different media. Her approach is grounded in collective creation and spatiality—spaces built both physically and through imagination. Energy never dies; it only changes form.

Saban Ramadani is an actor and performance, sound, and video artist whose work engages with social structures and political themes. He is currently part of a research group studying whiteness as a social phenomenon.

Titus Torniainen is a Helsinki-based lighting, video, and spatial designer working in the performing arts. For him, collectivity and content-driven design are the salt and pepper of the work. He frequently engages with concepts of beauty, hope, emotional proximity and norm-critical design.

Steeze Afrika is a creative and cultural movement based in Ghana, centered on African street dance, art, self-expression, and cultural identity. Their practice blends afro-fusion dance and performance art, where movement, Black consciousness, and communal participation merge. Their work and performances are often shared through social media, video, and live events. The Steeze Afrika dancers featured in the work’s video are Edmund Boateng Akrofi, Alber Kingsley Annan, Stephanie Donkor, Sandy Amoah, Godfrey Nunoo, and Mary Addis-Ababa Ackwerh.

Ghana Dance Ensemble is a dance and music group based in Accra specializing in traditional Ghanaian practices. The musicians heard in the piece are Christopher Ametornyo, Fadila Addy, Safianu Umar, Shushu Dafla, Emmanuel Avornyo, Micheal Akakpo, and Barnbas Tengepare.

Zodiak’s Good Vibes East youth project In the Good Vibes East summer project (2024) organized by Zodiak, Ama Kyei, Wanda Holopainen, Rosaliina Elgland, Sophia Mitiku, and local young people created a dance-based video work. The process explored themes chosen by the youth, with freedom, the secret garden, and the inner flame emerging as central. The piece includes reflections shared by Neri Maakorpi during the youth project.