ODILI DONALD ODITA: FROM PERIPHERY TO CENTER

August 8, 2020 - March 21, 2021

Nigerian-born, Philadelphia-based artist Odili Donald Odita is best known for his use of color in hard-edged, abstract paintings and public mural projects. Odita’s interwoven blocks of color are derived from a variety of influences; from the vibrant wallpapers he grew up with in his Columbus, Ohio household, to the old-school methods of Jazz and Nigerian Highlife music composition, alongside traditional African artifacts. For Laumeier, Odita’s findings will inform the design of commissioned flags to be exhibited outdoors in the Park and off site at Jeske Sculpture Park in Ferguson, Missouri. The designs are extractions of his research on the ideas around the periphery and the center, most specifically looking at the geographic and social relationship between Ferguson, Missouri in North County and Laumeier Sculpture Park, located in Sunset Hills in South County.

Using his signature color formations, From Periphery to Center is a meditation on similarities and differences, bonds and divisions. Odita’s works have great potential to reverberate with our visitors from near and far by creating a metaphorical and physical dialogue through sculpture. Shared between sites, his flags have the ability to engage with a range of visitors through his attempt to connect two seemingly disparate locales.

ARTIST BIOGRAPHY

Odili Donald Odita (b. 1966, Enugu, Nigeria) is an abstract painter whose work has been exhibited internationally for over 25 years. His recent solo exhibitions include Cape Town, New York, and Milan. He has been included in significant group exhibitions including Prospect 4 in New Orleans and the Front Triennial in Cleveland. His work is held in museum collections including Baltimore Museum of Art, Hirshhorn Museum, Newark Museum, New Orleans Museum of Art, Perez Art Museum and Studio Museum in Harlem, among many more. His commissions and public installations have ranged from the Venice Biennale to the United Nations. He holds a BFA from Ohio State University and a MFA from Bennington College. He lives in Philadelphia, where he serves as a professor of art at Tyler School of Art and Architecture at Temple University.

Laumeier Sculpture Park’s ongoing operations and programs are generously supported by St. Louis County Parks; Regional Arts Commission; Missouri Arts Council; Arts and Education Council; among other corporations, foundations, individual donors and members. 

Additional funding related to  COVID-19 relief has been provided by the National Endowment for the Arts, the Windgate Foundation, the U.S. Small Business Administration, and the St. Louis County Small Business Relief Program.

2020 Exhibitions are supported by Ellen and Durb Curlee, Alison and John Ferring, Jan and Ronnie Greenberg, Nancy and Ken Kranzberg, Joan and Mitchell Markow and Two Sister’s Foundation, Emily Rauh Pulitzer, Mary Ann and Andy Srenco. 

Odili Donald Odita: From Periphery to Center is supported by the Windgate Foundation, the Whitaker Foundation and the Vilcek Foundation.