A Nigerian visual artist, Malik Afegbua, is using artificial intelligence to document and preserve cultural memory, combining emerging technology with storytelling to safeguard histories that are often under-recorded or at risk of being lost.
Based in Lagos, Afegbua has been working on AI-assisted creative projects that draw from oral histories, family archives, and community narratives to reconstruct and preserve cultural identity in digital form. He says the aim is not to replace traditional storytelling, but to extend its reach and lifespan.
He explains that many important histories exist only in personal memory and are rarely formally documented. According to him, AI tools help organise and transform fragmented materials, such as interviews, photographs, and spoken accounts, into structured visual and narrative archives accessible to future generations.
Afegbua describes the process as a form of “memory preservation,” arguing that technology can strengthen cultural continuity when used responsibly. He notes that the work is particularly urgent in contexts where archival systems are incomplete or uneven.
Cultural researchers observing the trend say initiatives like his reflect a growing movement across Africa, where artists and technologists are using AI to fill gaps in historical documentation and preserve indigenous knowledge systems. One Lagos-based historian noted that informal histories are often lost due to limited documentation infrastructure, adding that digital tools now offer new ways to address that challenge.
However, experts also caution that AI-driven preservation must be handled carefully. A digital media scholar emphasised that such projects require a strong ethical foundation, including obtaining consent from contributors and carefully verifying source material to avoid distortion.
Despite these concerns, Afegbua maintains that the urgency of preservation outweighs hesitation. He argues that without deliberate efforts to capture living memory now, many cultural narratives may disappear permanently, and AI simply provides a faster way to scale that preservation work.
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