Instagram story viewer> @ayoolaart> Posts
GBOLAHAN AYOOLA(@ayoolaart)'s profile avatar HD Profile

GBOLAHAN AYOOLA

@ayoolaart

33.1K
followers
2159
following
Material, mark, and the archaeology of consciousness
www.gbolahanayoola.com
POSTS STORIES REELS TAGGED
If painting is approached only as representation, its task is to depict what already exists. But if painting is understood as a way of thinking, questioning and excavating, then it becomes another means through which a society can examine the foundations upon which it stands. - #culturalfoundations #powerofart #painting by @ayoolaart
7
a day ago
Download
🎩 by @ayoolaart
7
5 days ago
Download
🎩 by @ayoolaart
6
10 days ago
Download
“ In Gbolahan’s paintings, the figure emerges as a monumental yet enigmatic form. Rendered in dense black pigment and marked with incisions, scratches, and gestural inscriptions, these figures appear less as portraits than as vessels of experience. Their surfaces evoke excavation marks or ritual symbols, suggesting that the human body itself can be read as an archive shaped by time, belief, and historical tension” #Process by @ayoolaart
8
16 days ago
Download
The story goes that during World War II, when Churchill was supposedly asked whether Britain should cut funding for the arts in order to put more money into the war effort, he supposedly replied: “Then what are we fighting for? - #powerofart #artiswar #realreal by @ayoolaart
19
20 days ago
Download
Way to learn by @ayoolaart
3
a month ago
Download
“ Every empire in history believed it was permanent Athens, Rome, the British Empire until the very structures built to sustain their power became the structures that consumed it “. Cultural Foundations, also speak from this historical warning and from what I see happening around us today. The world is changing. Global power is shifting, old systems are beginning to fracture, and new ones are struggling to take their place. For me, culture is not an ornament. It is an infrastructure. It is what carries memory, identity, knowledge, and a sense of continuity from one generation to another. Through painting, installation, and conceptual projects rooted in painting , clay, and local material practices, I examine what remains when the systems we depend on begin to fail. I am interested in the foundations beneath society, the things we inherit, forget, preserve, and sometimes destroy. The work asks a simple but difficult question: what holds us together when political, economic, and ideological structures begin to crack? And when they eventually disappear, what remains of us? by @ayoolaart
0
a month ago
Download
I’ve always seen the ultimate art studio as a cathedral or even a shrine. Art is spiritual. It deserves a sacred space. Like Yoruba classical artists who placed sculptures in shrines to charge the atmosphere with presence, I see my art as stained glass in a temple of creativity. The result ? A space that feels solemn, sacred, and spiritually alive. #ArtStudio #SacredSpace #ContemporaryArt #ArtAsRitual #ArtAndSpirituality by @ayoolaart
4
a month ago
Download
THE SURFACE IS NEVER THE FULL STORY My process is deliberately repetitive. I work through accumulation. A mark sits on another mark. A layer covers another layer. Something disappears and then returns. Sometimes I don’t know exactly what will emerge. That is part of the process. The surface becomes a record of decisions, revisions, concealments and discoveries. In this sense, the painting behaves like memory. We remember selectively. We forget selectively. Some things remain clear. Others become fragments. Some memories are covered by newer experiences but never completely disappear. The same thing happens culturally. A building may be destroyed, but photographs remain. A ritual may disappear, but its symbols remain. A language may weaken, but certain words survive. A story may no longer be told in its original form, but traces of it remain inside the way people behave. The archive is not always a book. Sometimes the archive is a wall. Sometimes it is a pattern. Sometimes it is a proverb. Sometimes it is a ritual. Sometimes it is a painting. #powerofart #culturalfoundations #history #gbolahanayoola by @ayoolaart
4
a month ago
Download
MEET THE FLASH MENTORS GBOLAHAN AYOOLA (Visual Artist & Cultural Storyteller) ____________________________________________________ Gbolahan Ayoola is a Lagos-based visual artist whose practice explores African identity, heritage and the enduring influence of colonialism. Raised within a traditional Yoruba palace environment shaped by both indigenous culture and Christianity, his work examines the intersection of Esu and Christ as a lens through which to question coloniality in African art. ____________________________________________________ A Fine and Applied Arts graduate of Obafemi Awolowo University, Gbolahan brings over two decades of artistic experience, with works held internationally. Beyond his practice, he is deeply committed to mentoring and nurturing the next generation of African artists. ____________________________________________________ Once Upon a Time (O.U.T) Residency Edition I: Our Story First #OUTResidency #OurStoryFirst #Outliers #KokopelliAt5 by @ayoolaart
7
2 months ago
Download
#Repost @latitudes.online with @use.repost ・・・ What does it mean to have evidence of who we are?⁠ ⁠ In Cultural Foundations II: The Evidence of Who We Are, artist and writer Gbolahan Ayoola considers how cultural memory is held across stories, rituals, landscapes, architecture, artefacts and systems of knowledge passed between generations.⁠ ⁠ Moving between archaeology, oral tradition and contemporary art, Ayoola asks us to consider what happens when the evidence of our histories exists, but remains unseen or inaccessible, and what responsibility we have to recognise, preserve and transmit it.⁠ ⁠ Read Cultural Foundations II: The Evidence of Who We Are on Latitudes Online using the link in our bio!⁠ ⁠ #LatitudesOnline #ArtFromAfrica #gbolahanayoola #culturalfoundations by @ayoolaart
0
2 months ago
Download
A memorable exchange with Prof. Bruce Onabrakpeya as he engaged deeply with my Cultural Foundations series. His particular curiosity was drawn to the material: bonded earth. For me, it is more than a medium it carries memory, place, ancestry and the physical realities from which culture is formed. In this body of work, earth becomes a language through which I reflect on the foundations that hold communities together: inherited knowledge, identity, environment and lived history. To have Prof. Onabrakpeya whose practice has continually expanded the possibilities of material, printmaking and African visual language pause to interrogate the work was both humbling and affirming. Cultural Foundations continues my exploration of how indigenous materials can preserve, question and reimagine our cultural narratives for the present and the future. #CulturalFoundations #BondedEarth #BruceOnabrakpeya #MaterialCulture #CulturalHeritage by @ayoolaart
13
2 months ago
Download

Download All

Save the photos and videos currently loaded on this page.

0Photos
0Videos
Ready to download 0 / 0

Keep this tab open until your download is ready.
back to up