W04_Odili Odita
(Artist research)
Biographic data Quotes from wikipedia, artist statements, descriptions, etc… Statement from personal website:
“Color in itself has the possibility of mirroring the complexity of the world as much as it has the potential for being distinct.”
The organization and patterning in the paintings are of my own design. I continue to explore in the paintings a metaphoric ability to address the human condition through pattern, structure and design, as well as for its possibility to trigger memory. The colors I use are personal: they reflect the collection of visions from my travels locally and globally. This is also one of the hardest aspects of my work as I try to derive the colors intuitively, hand-mixing and coordinating them along the way. In my process, I cannot make a color twice – it can only appear to be the same. This aspect is important to me as it highlights the specificity of differences that exist in the world of people and things. “What is most interesting to me is a fusion of cultures where things that seem faraway and disparate have the ability to function within an almost seamless flow. The fusion I seek is one that can represent a type of living within a world of difference. No matter the discord, I believe through art there is a way to weave the different parts into an existent whole, where metaphorically, the notion of a common humanity can be understood as real.” I want to expand upon painting to reinvestigate its inherent means, as well as contribute to its ongoing intellectual future. My commitment to painting has come with a growing understanding of quality and beauty that can be found through painting, and how beauty, when actualized, can communicate a complete consciousness.
“African culture is so interregnal to western culture, and yet the continent continues to exist as a region denigrated in the mind of the entire world. I wish to re-channel the negative thinking around Africa, speak from the center of its present-ness, and expand upon what I know and understand about the history of this amazing and unquantifiable place.”
Artworks
https://www.artsy.net/artist/odili-donald-odita
Books and published work What books inspired them? What books have they written?
Exhibitions Documentation, links, critics, comments about exhibitions related to the artist. EQUALIZER - Studio Museum Harlem Body and Space - Jack Shainman Gallery Climate Change - Berggruen
Articles
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=n7TDTztRbcU&
Article: https://www.artnews.com/art-in-america/aia-reviews/odili-donald-odita-60836/
Article (not strictly about Odita): https://www.artnews.com/art-news/news/changing-complex-profile-of-black-abstract-painters-2452/