Lola Ogbara is one of three St. Louis-based artists featured in “Exposure 21: Three Myths,” an exhibition opening August 29 at UMSL’s Gallery 210.
According to Gallery 210 Director Terry Suhre, Ogbara’s artwork looks to the intersections of Blackness, queerness and womanhood as a way to process the circumstances of these identities throughout time.
“My practice explores the multifaceted implications and ramifications of sexuality in regards to the Black experience,” Ogbara said in an artist statement. “I work with clay as a material in order to emphasize a necessary fragility which symbolizes an essential contradiction implicit in empowerments.”
Ogbara was born and raised in Chicago and earned an MFA in Visual Arts from Washington University Sam Fox School of Art & Design.
“Imagining experiences without deviant myths that perpetually place Black feminine sexuality in anguish tied to horrid racist histories, I often use and reference my own body to create possibilities of pleasure,” Ogbara stated.
“Through material usage and composition, I emphasize the nexus between Western colonization and contemporary Black social cultures in order to further progressions of a future that isn’t reliant on history.”
Because of the COVID-19 pandemic, this and all other UMSL gallery exhibitions will be presented online during the 2020-21 academic year. The gallery will be open to the public by appointment only and will limit groups to no more than 10. Masks are required.
The other artists in “Exposure 21: Three Myths,” which will remain on display through December 5, are Julian Curran, and Emma Vidal. All three will participate in an online panel discussion moderated by Jessica Baran, director of Curatorial and Program Development at Barrett Barrera Projects, at 4 p.m. on Saturday, August 29.
For more information, visit the Gallery 210 website or contact Gallery 210 at 314-516-5976 or by email at gallery@umsl.edu.
