“Roto” is the Shona word for dream — a fitting title for an album that explores visions of self, spirit and sonic awakening.
The question
Mbira Renaissance is a band dedicated to modern interpretations of traditional Zimbabwean mbira music. The brief was the official album artwork: a design that resonates with both heritage and innovation, honouring African visual culture while appealing to a contemporary, global audience.
The idea
ROTO is a visual and musical journey into the world of dreams — not just sleep dreams, but ancestral dreams, liberation dreams and futures dreamed into being. It is a celebration of Afrofuturism through the lens of mbira music, rooted in African tradition while reaching for cosmic possibility.
The making
The word ROTO is rendered in a stylised script based on Chimbire: a newly reimagined script inspired by the visual traditions and phonetic systems of the Shona language. Chimbire is a decolonial typographic system developed to honour and extend the expressive potential of Shona writing, informed by ancestral symbol systems, oral traditions and phonetic nuance.
The world
Related research: chiShona reimagined.