Events

Spring 2021 Sciame Series: Kayode Ojo, Olu Obafemi, and Ebony L. Haynes

EHKOOO

Please join us for the new SCIAME Lecture Series, titled And/Or. “EHKOOO” will feature Kayode Ojo and Olu Obafemi, introduced by Ebony L. Haynes, for a discussion of art and architecture.

Free and open to the public - Please register for this Zoom event here.

In this online series, curators Viren Brahmbhatt, Ali C. Höcek, and Martin Stigsgaard argue that the traditional format of a single lecturer speaking to an audience sets up a binary opposite all of its own -- speaker/listener, which simply reinforces the power structure between those who "possess" knowledge and those who "consume" it. In its place, the &/Or Online Dialogues will present two speakers in conversation with each other, moderated by a third. The series features prominent artists, activists, and architects from across the globe who will discuss their work and the unique political and environmental challenges they confront.

Kayode Ojo’s practice encompasses sculpture, photography, video and installation. His precise staging of objects and exhibitions reveals a vivid sense of the theatricality, artifice and seduction inherent to art, advertising, fashion and design; how we present ourselves and perceive one another. Gender and race are upended in object-collages that alternate between freaky/frisky femininity and suave masculine friction. In one arrangement, a gold straight-edge razor registers as style meets menace. In all his work, Kayode Ojo mines and undermines a conceptual glamour. Kayode Ojo (b. 1990 in Cookeville, Tennessee) received a BFA from the School of Visual Arts. He currently lives and works in New York, NY.

Select exhibitions include: The Aviator, Martos Gallery, New York, NY (2020); All of Them Witches, Deitch, Los Angeles, CA (2020); Never Been Kissed, Praz-Delavallade, Los Angeles, CA (2020); Art Brussels, Martos Gallery, Brussels, BE (2019); Horology, Jack Hanley Gallery, New York, NY (2019); Equilibrium, Martos Gallery, New York, NY (2018); Betrayal, Galerie Balice Hertling, Paris, France (2018); Running on Empty, And Now, Dallas, TX (2018); Zoe Leonard, Kayode Ojo, curated by Laura Hunt, Paula Cooper Gallery, New York, NY (2018); and Invisible Man, Martos Gallery, New York, NY (2017).

Olu Obafemi was born in Akutupa Bunu, Kogi State, Nigeria, in 1950. He obtained his Bachelor of Arts Degree in English from Ahmadu Bello University, Zaria, Nigeria (1975); MA (English) from University of Sheffield, and PhD English from the School of English, University of Leeds, England (1981).

A prolific playwright, novelist, poet, literary and theatre scholar, Olu Obafemi has published fifteen scholarly publications and eighteen creative books (plays, poetry and a novel). His scholarly publications include the landmark study on Nigerian theatre titled Contemporary Nigerian Theatre, Politics and Aesthetics in Nigerian Theatre and Aesthetics and Ideology in Nigerian Theatre, Politics and Aesthetics in Nigerian Theatre, Public Discourse; culture, language and literature, Ideology, Stage-craft in Nigeria, and Humanities as Curative Prognosis for the Nigerian State.

His creative works are Wheels (Novel), Illuminations, Songs of Hope (Poetry), Naira has No Gender, Dark Times Are Over, Nights of a Mystical Beast, Pestle of the Mortar, Ogidi Mandate (winner of 2011 ANA/J.P.Clark Prize for Drama), Suicide Syndrome, The New Dawn, Scapegoats and Sacred Cows, Running Dreams...Twirls of Adiitu and Iyunade and Ajon! AThe Legend that made a King/dom (Plays).

A journalist of over three decades, Obafemi has been an editorial consultant, editorial board member, and columnist for numerous national dailies.

Olu Obafemi was a professor of English and Dramatic Literature of the University of Ilorin from 1990 to 2020. Obafemi was the sole recipient of the Nigerian National Order of Merit in 2018. He is currently the national Chairman of the Nigerian Reproduction Rights Society of Nigeria.

Ebony L. Haynes is a curator, writer, and gallery director, currently based in New York.