Kayode Ojo
Kayode Ojo, L’Amant Double (Vienna), 2020. Courtesy of the artist and Sweetwater. Photograph by kunst-dokumentation.com
For Gallery Weekend 2021, Sweetwater will present a solo exhibition by Kayode Ojo, whose work explores the intersection of interpersonal relations, popular culture, ersatz glamor, and mass-produced materials through sculpture, photography, and video. His sculptures take the form of ready-made assemblage, frequently constructed from glass, mirrors, clothing, and furniture, accented with rhinestone or acrylic jewelry; their shape is informed by specific events, locations, or scenes from films. Through photography, Ojo documents spontaneous moments using a 35mm point-and-shoot camera, often capturing deeply private scenes of closeness or vulnerability. Ojo typically exhibits his photographs in series, with related images selected from an archive of thousands of photographs spanning years. His cool, deliberate sculptures and candid, intimate photographs consider how the objects with which we surround ourselves, the clothes we wear, and the culture we consume affect our behavior, desires, relationships, and identity.
Kayode Ojo’s sculptures involve such materials that mobilize or depend on visual attention. In assembly, however, these instruments, garments, and ornaments, extricated from their original optical economy, focus a clinical dissection of perception and seduction.
Alex Bennett, Mousse Magazine, Issue 74
Kayode Ojo, Lower East Side (High Rise), 2019. Courtesy of the artist and Sweetwater. Photograph by graysc.de.
Kayode Ojo, He Enjoyed His Privacy, 2020. Courtesy of the artist and Sweetwater. Photograph by Diana Pfammatter