Emmanuel Osahor

Untitled (Garden Study) - In Progress, 2020

Live Studio Session on October 27th, at 6:30 PM (MST)

Over the years, it has become clear to me that what I expected when I emigrated from Nigeria to Canada was a utopia. Ignorant of Canada’s similar colonial legacy, and the consistent mirage of capitalist versions of paradise, I put Canada on a pedestal since it was labelled “developed” and Nigeria “developing”. After witnessing the realities in both countries, and with a growing awareness of the current ecological, social and political turmoil, I understand now that even as utopic visions of development and progress are desired and pursued across the world, marginalization, separation and poverty continue to exist.

In light of this reality, my practice is centered around the desire to create spaces within which we can sit with the resulting complexity and grief inherent in contemporary existence. My work engages with contemporary understandings of utopia as tools for critical inquiry, notions of beauty as an act of care, the history of landscape painting and photography, and philosophies of gardens as constructed sanctuary spaces. The gardens I depict function as fictional utopias that posit a future for bodies of culture like myself and the plethora of others that exist today, to be held without prejudice while leaving space for a process of collecting grieving and the imagining of possible futures.