All hail Okore of Earth, Barks and Topography

Yejide Gbenga-Ogundare, Lagos

Nnenna OkoreThere is a belief that one’s background goes a long way in shaping one’s latent qualities and defining one’s creative tendencies. This has been proved right by Nnenna Okore, a Nigerian visual artist based in the United States.

Okore is a lady whose diverse exposure rather than erode her values, has enhanced her commune with nature. She stands for millions of Nigerians who because they live abroad has been forced to find an identity between the ties to a country of their origin and the new cultural influences in their host country.

When she was introduced recently at the Meet The Artist Programme at Goethe- institute Nigeria , the German cultural centre in Lagos , Okore’s works titled, Of Earth, Barks and Topography speaks volumes about the artist’s love for nature and her qualities as an artist of great repute.

“The uniquely diverse and tactile qualities of the natural world hold such strong fascination for me. I am intrigued, by the forces of nature that interact with and shape the natural terrains which we share with other living beings. I am captivated and transformed by the transient processes that occur over the passage of time, resulting in phenomenal earthly textures and formations of visual complexities,” Okore explained.

As an artist, Okore has successfully carried her audience along in her quest for identity. Her works on display at Goethe institute are abstract and simple as well as entangling and organic in appearance. These scriptural pieces broadly define reference structures associated with plant life and environmental relief, Okore once described.

Okore explores the fascinating and strangely beautiful processes of decay, erosion in nature as well as the organic matter into new and different forms. Hers is an art that answers diverse questions about nature while also celebrating the beauty of all natural processes.

Goethe institute has packaged a stunning exhibition of Okore’s works titled Earth, Barks and Topography which will hold from June 20 to July 10, 2009 within their premises at Victoria Island in Lagos.

In Okore’s hands, ordinary materials and cast offs of the industrial world become transformed into arresting works of beauty. She displays great sensitivity to materials in her sculpture with a great attention to detail in the obsessive accretion of pattern and texture that parallels the beauty of nature.

Speaking about the exhibition, Okore said that, “this exhibition is not only intended to heighten the viewer’s awareness and perception of the alluring textures, undulating contours and organic movements that exist within our earth bound environment, but to call for more reflection on the preservation and care of our natural surroundings and the earth in general.

“The sculptural pieces created for this show broadly reference structures associated with plant life and environmental relief. I am drawn to the repetitive and yet, timeless patterns of biomorphic forms. I am fascinated by their temporariness, their physical integrities and their agelessness.”

Although Okore has travelled to many countries and currently lives in US, her formative years in Nigeria continue to shape her ideas and local use of everything and anything as materials. Her works employ a mixture of common urban objects such as newspapers, ropes and twigs which clearly reminds her of the struggles of impoverished Africans who by necessity recycle most things. Hers is a touch which balances objects between ascension and the pull of earth’s gravity.

A Tale of Two in Time: Letters to Susan

Seyi Hodonu’s A Tale of Two in Time: Letters to Susan is a deviation from the normal poetic productions which are usually burdened with the socio-political state of their time.

His collection is the celebration of the connubial contract which was inaugurated at the garden of Eden. It prioritises, among other things, one of the greatest gifts cocooned within man which is his ability to love.

Hodonu’s artistic musings are crafted and sourced from the Judeao-Christian pool. In other words, the Bible is his langue which has created the parole. The poems reflect, in most vivid terms, that philosophical truism that love is as complicated as man himself.

The thematic thrust of Hodonu’s poeticraft can be deciphered from the beginning of the anthology to the end. It depicts, with various trappings, that fluid nature of love.
In order to gain a high level of verisimilitude, the persona engages his lover in a dialogue with the aid of letters. In “Don’t blame me,” the persona appeals to his lover that there are certain peculiarities in him which nature has made impossible for him to change.

One of the poems, which the reader will find not only engaging, rhythmical but equally emotionally laden, is “Never forget.” It celebrates polarities with the portrayal of different aspects of the elemental imbued with the artistic power to be metaphorical.

For the persona, different seasons definitely will suffice but of which should not determine the state of their love. It encapsulates that pristine essence of love which is meant to traverse both the temporal and the spatial.

Hodonu’s crafting of love is not one which is only pivoted on emotion but that which is propelled by reason and a deep sense of knowledge. In “Hear of my beloved,” love becomes imbued with the power of foreknowledge.

There is the depiction of folly and superfluity ingrained in infidelity which is one of the most inimical foibles crippling man’s interaction as found in “My soul seeks not the stranger’s strokes.”

Love takes a drastically compelling force as it summons the two lovers to a world of mutual commitment which must be placed within the ambit of trust.

While the anthology foregrounds monogamy, it subtly de-privileges polygamy. A feminist reading of the text will find the thematic preoccupation that man’s achievements are only limited except aided with the help of a woman. In “How well heaven’s helpmate,” there is the valorisation of the female energy. Here, women are placed on pedestals which centralise rather than marginalise their worth. She is crafted in her full paraphernalia, configuratively depicted as a mother-one who is essentially in the procreation process. She is a friend, a help-meet. She is a sister-one whose words are soothing. And above all, she is a wife, the fulfillment of her greatest office.

Seyi Hodonu’s language is quite commendable. The primordial power of love in human interaction and especially between the two genders is encapsulating.