PHASES AND FACES
Wunika Mukan Gallery is pleased to present Phases and Faces, the second solo exhibition of Lagos based mixed-media painter, Adulphina Imuede. Phases and Faces marks Adulphina Imuede’s entry into the unknown. The work takes inspiration from illustrative expressions through artists like Audrey Kawasaki and Florian Nicolle. She recontextualizes them by creating with traditional tools, while infusing them with a sense of whimsy. Although there are stylistic similarities to her previous works, two things differ. One, the artist uses acrylic more generously, a departure from her primarily oil based creations. Two, this series was borne out of uncertainty, digging into depths previously unexplored by Imuede. Faces and Phases asks what audacious hope looks like in the face of unavoidable disruption.
In I Close My Eyes to Dream (2022), the world is contained in a Black girl’s purple hair and blue dress. In them we see the capacity for beauty. The bobble head subject looks to be asleep. She really isn’t. She is doing something more interesting. She is exercising her right to audacious imagination. If she can imagine it well enough, she might just be able to change her reality. And Imuede’s series does not negotiate the female gaze as the principal viewpoint. In creating Phases and Faces, the viewer is treated to a feverish faith in dreams and the unseen. With oil and acrylic, Imuede invites us all into the possibilities of self discovery within ourselves and within others. Inspired by uncertainty, Phases and Faces is Imuede refocusing the volatility of her physical environment into something clear, hopeful and even beautiful. The works are a tribute to grace. The audience is dared to look and find something they didn’t even know they needed.
Emotions take center stage. A cursory glance at in Many Suns (2022) may mislead you to drown in the ease of two slender Black twins. But pay closer attention. Notice the heads in the clouds, the appearance of refinement despite the subjects having half bodies. The sun as a counterfoil to the clouds. An exploration of the shifts life demands of us. Equal importance is assigned to the need to be clear and open eyed, as it is to close one's eyes and dream fiercely. Dreams after all are what push Imuede’s work, especially in times of unprecedented global uncertainty, where chaos has defined our realities for what feels like an unending time. Faces and Phases mines through the rubble as a quest, at once situating the personal with the universal desire for peace, beauty and clarity.
