YVONNE OSEI: TAILORED LANDSCAPES

2017 KRANZBERG EXHIBITION SERIES

For the 2017 Kranzberg Exhibition Series, conceptual artist Yvonne Osei creates a large-scale photo installation to occupy the breadth and width of the indoor gallery, constructing an environment where textile creates landscape. Inspired by both the cultural and physical landscapes of the Park, Osei weaves design motifs from her home country of Ghana into her photographic and videographic documentation of the Park to create new and unique patterns for Laumeier. Using her textural understanding of fashion design to mold and manipulate an adhesive fabric, Osei creates an environment that uses the architecture of the gallery as figure and form. With Tailored Landscapes, Osei continues her inquiry utilizing the import of textiles as a medium to celebrate diversity in culture and in nature.

“Tailored Landscapes contextualizes textiles as physical and metaphorical landscapes,” says Osei. “Throughout the past year, I have photographed various sites within the Park to capture visitors’ interactions and use of the space. For this exhibition, I utilize the photographs to create a collection of vibrantly patterned, textile designs that bear a strong resemblance to traditional West African fabrics commonly worn in my home country of Ghana.”

The Kranzberg Exhibition Series is a longstanding annual program funded by Nancy and Ken Kranzberg that supports the development of exhibitions and large-scale sculptural commissions for regional artists. The series helps to place local artists inside international contexts of larger thematic group exhibitions curated at Laumeier.

ARTIST BIOGRAPHY

Yvonne Osei was born in Germany to Ghanaian parents. She received her M.F.A. in 2016 from Washington University in St. Louis, where she was a Chancellors Graduate Fellow, Mr. and Mrs. Spencer T. Olin Fellow and Danforth Scholar. She received her B.F.A. from Webster University, St. Louis, in 2013. Selected exhibitions and performances include the University of Houston, Texas; Overland Park Arboretum and Botanical Gardens, Kansas; Provincetown Art Association and Museum, Massachusetts; Dallas Arboretum and Botanical Garden; Mildred Lane Kemper Art Museum, Washington University, St. Louis; Saint Louis Art Museum; Bruno David Gallery, St. Louis; Bijlmermeer, Amsterdam, Netherlands; Ariana Park, Geneva, Switzerland; Giardini della Biennale, Venice, Italy; PLUG Projects, Kansas City; Lone Star Art District, San Antonio; Des Lee Gallery, St. Louis; and the Regional Arts Commission, St. Louis. Osei is the 2016–17 Romare Bearden Graduate Minority Fellow at the Saint Louis Art Museum; she is currently the inaugural Curator-In-Residence at the Center of Creative Arts (COCA) and an Adjunct Professor at Webster University.