ART-TRIBUTE:Weaving and other Practices… Nnenna Okore

We continue our Tribute with  Nnenna Okore (1975), who creates abstract, richly textured wall sculptures from recycled materials. Okore’s large scale sculptures stem from her early-life experiences, addressing concepts of recycling, transformation, and regeneration of forms constructed by natural materials: found paper, fibers, coffee, and clay, often sourced from West Africa. Okore’s structures mimic the intricacies of the fabric, trees, bark, and topography familiar from her childhood in Nigeria. Her manually repetitive techniques of fraying, weaving, dyeing, and sewing recall her childhood experiences, where she watched and participated in daily manual activities.

By Efi Michalarou

Nnenna Okore was born in Australia to parents from Ututu, Abia State in Nigeria. After moving from Australia to Nigeria at the age of four, Okore spent most of her childhood in the university town of Nsukka in southeastern Nigeria, where both parents worked as academics at the University of Nigeria, Nsukka. Living in the senior staff quarters located close to the campus borders and the rural population, she was in constant contact with the off-campus community. In 1995, Okore enrolled into the Fine and Applied Arts undergraduate program at the University of Nigeria, Nsukka. Her early mediums were oil and acrylic. Though she found the use of color fascinating, she was not satisfied with her painting projects, because she believed that the techniques practiced at the Nsukka school lacked originality, since everyone painted in a similar fashion or with the same concept. By her third year, she began experimenting with unusual materials on canvas. She employed leaves, jute, cloth, sticks, shredded photographs, broomsticks, recycled paper, leather and practically any material accessible within her surroundings. Subsequently, she started creating free-flowing surfaces that were characterized by their textural build-up of paint, soil, rope, fabric and other found objects. Rather than remain loyal to the flat angular surfaces, she became invested in the exploring of flow and movement through her media. By her final year, her works were largely focused on issues of consumption and inventive recycling as it related to the Nigerian experience. Shortly after graduating and freelancing for two years, Okore relocated to the United States for an MFA program at the University of Iowa. Moving overseas obviously bore new challenges. While it estranged her from her family and the Nigerian cultural and political experience that largely informed her creative processes, it allowed her to explore new ground, expanding her interests to include ideas about materiality, ephemerality and life cycles. Though her works have evolved in the last decade and a half, they continue to reveal uniquely diverse and tactile characteristics of the physical and natural world. Her works highlight imminent events such as aging, death and decay that catalize weathering and dilapidation of forms in the natural landscape – processes that subtly capture the fluid and delicate nature of life. A career in academia followed after she graduated from the University of Iowa. She was recruited by North Park University to teach and oversee the Sculpture Unit of the Art department in 2005. She is presently a Professor of Art, instructing undergraduate students in Three-Dimensional Design, Sculptural Practices and Drawing, among other subjects. Alongside her teaching experience she has maintained an art career, creating and exhibiting works that have attracted global audiences. To maintain her track record, she dedicates few days of the week to her studio practice, believing that the balance of one’s career with domestic demand is crucial to one’s success. In her 10-year career, Okore has participated in over 80 solo and group shows combined, across international venues in Asia, Europe, North America, Africa and the far east. Her works continue to receive rave reviews in prestigious art publications, including Sculpture Magazine, The New York Times, Financial Times, Art South Africa and Ceramics: Art and Perception. In 2012, Okore received a 2012/13 Fulbright Scholar Award. In fulfilment of this prestigious grant, she traveled to Nigeria for a year-long teaching project at the University of Lagos, while producing a series of new creative explorations. The experience also allowed her to interact and collaborate with artists and curators within the Lagos community. She returned to the United States after completing her project in 2013.