
Osi Audu maintains a visual language of geometric shapes and a diverse colour palette to explore the dualism of form and void, the ontological relation between the tangible and intangible, and the dual nature of self and self-consciousness. His works are portraits of the intangible self, rather than literal self-portraits of the artist. Referencing shapes of West-African masks and head sculptures, he uses the Yoruba concept of ‘the outer and inner head’ as a way of investigating issues of self-identity from the understanding that objects can contain, channel, and transform natural forces. Osi Audu’s works are inspired by geometric abstraction and focus on the head as a container of the self. His drawings explore blackness as light that is unperceivable by the eyes and speak to what is unknowable about the nature of the intangible self. His paintings in contrasting colours explore the head as a frame of self-consciousness. Audu undertook his BA in Fine art at University of Ife, Ile-Ife and MFA in Painting and Drawing at University of Goergia, Athens. He has had solo exhibitions across the US and Europe.