O’DA Art presents As We Are.
Depictions of the human figure have long been a way of making sense of ourselves and the world around us. Our bodies are far from neutral, both the part of ourselves we know most intimately, and the part most readily exposed to the gaze of others. It is fitting, then, that these representations of the human form remain one of art’s most powerful ways of portraying and exploring the sheer depth of our inner lives.
As We Are brings together artists who both engage with and push the boundaries of this exploration, highlighting the enduring power of the human form to communicate wherewords may escape us. Across distinct visual languages, the artists expand the possibilities of figuration, allowing abstraction and direct representation to mingle and coexist. At times the figure is rendered with clarity; at others it fragments, dissolves, or hovers at the edge of recognition, revealing a portrait of interior life and a constellation of emotional and societal truths.
Babatunde-Tribe Akande and Mubaraq Omotosho each grapple with the idea of our personhood as a unifying force, reminding us that beneath the differences that so often divide us, our shared humanity remains strikingly intact. While Akande’s works dissolve towards abstraction, and Omotosho’s practice more explicitly harnesses the human figure, both depict the search for empathy and connection in a world increasingly shaped by division. Chidimma Nwafor’s subtly expressive figures inhabit ethereal, dreamlike landscapes, hinting at psychological spaces only accessible through memory, while Wisdom Uchedisrupts the conventions of portraiture with moments of cartoonish surreal intervention, unsettling our expectations of traditionalist painting. Emmanuel Chidube explores the figure through the collective, considering how identity is shaped through shared experiences and community, while Osaji Chinedu George uses deconstructed forms to examine mythology, storytelling, and the continuities that bind generations together. Finally, Oluwatobiloba Aremu employs softly luminous figures to explore the psychological and spiritual dimensions of faith.
Though distinct in approach, each artist demonstrates the capacity of the figure, as a vehicle to explore and convey the true depths of lived experience. The works invite viewers into each artist’s inner world, not to arrive at a definitive understanding, but to encounter each artist as they are.