Buying and Selling
The work of Ojo Olaniyi reflects a richly decorated narrative style depicting everyday scenes in the kaleidoscope of Nigerian life. Olaniyi’s art comprises vignettes of social and commercial life in a technique known as epoxy etching. While each image relates to a particular action of daily life—teaching a child, buying fish at a market, or engaging in money matters—a swirl of graphic decoration is embedded in each print creating a density of pattern and linear description.
Ojo Olaniyi
Olaniyi’s prints are grounded in real time, yet they depart from a more classic realism. The figures in each print are not identified, but to the viewer they appear familiar.
In the exquisite Tray of Knowledge (one of the eight images in this feature), Olaniyi comments on the evolution of knowledge acquisition by replacing the traditional use of slate and chalk that children used to scribble on (before advancing to paper), with computers of all sizes. Neither ironic nor sentimental, Olaniyi conveys with aesthetic clarity and vision, a method of learning that has changed over time.
-Visual Arts Editor, Mary Behrens
Expectation
Fish Seller
Owonikoko (Money Matter)
Royal Messenger
The Drummer
Train Your Child
Tray of Knowledge
Ojo Olaniyi
Ojo Olaniyi graduated from the Ekiti State University in Ado Ekiti Nigeria where he studied under the master printmaker Bruce Onobrakpeya. He has taught in the renowned Harmattan Workshop and has exhibited widely in both Africa and continental Europe.
