OMENKA GALLERY: IT’S TODAY, ‘ROAD LESS TRAVELED’

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Omenka is proud to present Road Less Travelled, a joint exhibition of recent paintings by Derek Jahyem Jombo-Ogboi and Olubankole Olabode— two of the most exciting young artists working in Nigeria today—recognised for successfully expanding boundaries less travelled by their peers.

Through the juxtaposing of their individual styles and formal concerns, the exhibition celebrates each artist’s underlying philosophy and unique approach to interrogating such pertinent issues as migration, identity, mythology and contemporary politics.

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About the Artists

Derek Jahyem Jombo-Ogboi studied visual art at Yaba College of Technology.

Jombo-Ogboi draws influences from his birth and childhood in Benin, to address issues surrounding identity, ethnicity and status. His stylistic direction has also been shaped by the classical masters and their approach to the human figure.

Painting primarily on canvas, he is similarly adept at graffiti and auditory mediums. In his painting, Jombo-Ogboi exhibits a calm academic realism finely blended with elements of the surreal. Heavily laden with metaphors, his work is distinguishable by its complex layers of interwoven narratives, an exceptional approach to composition, colour, space and light as well as a deftness in capturing his figures with empathy.

Olubankole Olabode’s multi-faceted practice embraces primarily painting, calligraphy and illustration.

Olabode explores a diversity of media ranging from pastels, graphite and charcoal to pen and ink, coffee, watercolour, oil and acrylic—the latter two being his most favoured. Also, a talented muralist, his work centres on the religious and socio-political. In promoting critical thought and engaging conversations, Olabode employs satire as well as symbolic references as metaphors in addressing pertinent issues affecting Africa and her related diaspora. More recently, his body functions as the cynosure in paintings that at once become tools to interrogate, dismantle or reinforce often neglected societal values and knowledge systems.

Director of Centre for Contemporary Art (CCA), Lagos Oyinda Fakeye will also join both artists for a talk at gallery at 1pm on February 15, 2023. The conversation will revolve around each artist’s technique, process and underlying philosophy.

About the Moderator

Oyindamola Fakeye is the artistic director at Centre for Contemporary Art, Lagos. Fakeye also works with the British Council as West African Arts Associate Consultant and was a co-curator of the Lagos Biennial II How to Build a Lagoon with Just a Bottle of Wine (2019). At present, she also serves as the Director of the Arts in Medicine Fellowship, established to provide creative solutions for healthcare challenges through artistic and collaborative creative engagements between artists, healthcare providers, patients and caregivers.

She previously worked at the Southbank Centre and co-founded the Video Art Network Lagos (VAN, Lagos), which was set up to create a sustainable platform for the screening and presentation of New Media art in Nigeria.

About Omenka Gallery

Omenka Gallery is a leading art gallery in Nigeria and Africa, representing a fine selection of established and emerging contemporary Nigerian and international artists working in diverse media.

With a particular focus on ensuring a sustainable presence for Nigerian and African art within a larger global context, Omenka regularly participates in major international art events like; Art Dubai, UAE; The Armory Show, New York; the Joburg Art Fair; Cape Town Art Fair; Cologne Paper Art; LOOP, Barcelona; the London Art Fair and 1:54 Contemporary African Art Fair, London.

Omenka also offers to its esteemed clients a range of advisory services including appraisals, collections management, training and professional development, art finance, as well as industry reports and due diligence. Our in-depth knowledge is drawn from our diverse backgrounds built over 13 years, running and managing one of the leading galleries on the continent, consulting for other important galleries, auction houses and museums, and participating in prestigious events all over the world.

In association with Revilo, Omenka has an active publications programme and produces exquisite catalogues with informed, scholarly texts to accompany its schedule of solo, group and large themed exhibitions, through which it stimulates critical thought and discourse centred on contemporary art development in Nigeria, as well as Africa and its diaspora.

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