Skip to main content

My pottery is an extension of my sculpture- Ato Arinze.

Ato Arinze in his studio
By: Mathew B. Oyedele

Ato Arinze was recently a guest on Artsdiscourse with Mathew B. Oyedele - an online platform for the discourse and critique of the arts - where he shares his content, technique, and experiences.  

He opens up on his technique of production and how his method of copper finishing typically evident in his recent body of works came to be. He makes his pots with coiling methods. And recently, he likes to bend, compress and sometimes punch his vessels to delineate the unstable situations in the country. As a young artist, Ato would always go to the National Museum in Lagos to meditate before the Igbo-Ukwu bronze pots. This would later inspire his copper finishing method.

The artist did not fail to recognize his short stint with the iconic Abayomi Barber at the University of Lagos in 1993 as a stepping stone and blessing in his artistic career. He confides that the barber art school exposed him to detailed rendition of forms and dexterous execution which remains visible in his works.

He reveals how he is working closely with Djakou Kassi Nathalie to free contemporary ceramics from the prison of functionality and blur the differing line between fine art and applied art. He believes that ceramics can tell more stories as other genres of art. When asked if he's more of a sculptor or a potter, Ato replied: "My pottery is an extension of my sculptures. Most often I use the surface of my pots as canvas to represent my sculptural ideas in relief forms."

Ato Arinze also decries the inadequate knowledge that ceramic students are receive in Nigerian art schools where students work without proper equipments. ”Ceramics as a course in virtually all Nigerian art schools seem to suffer from neglect compared to other areas in the art departments. There are no adequate equipments and the few equipments that are available are not for students’ use. The disunity among ceramic lecturers also affect the teaching of the art in schools,” he said.

Ato also discussed his intention to support young and upcoming ceramic artists by organizing constant workshops and annual exhibitions in his group "Visions In Clay" as well as bi-annual shows under his explicit theme, "Beyond Functions."

The discourse was moderated by Mathew B. Oyedele and discussed by Chinezim Moghalu, Olajobi Olushola and Jennifer Burchill.




Comments

Popular posts from this blog

Seeing Through The Indignant Eye

Mathew Oyedele  With the ongoing happenings in the country, Samuel Ajobiewe is right to entitle his recent exhibition The Indignant Eye . These happenings did not just start but the faulty lines have always been there to be maneuvered by those who are entrusted with the sanctity of Nigerian institutions. The exhibition took its title from the 1969 book by Ralph E. Shikes which positions the artist as a social critic. Ajobiewe is not an unknown name in the Nigerian art scene. He is a renowned artist who works across diverse media including pastel, watercolour and acrylic. He had his first solo exhibition in 2009 at Mydrim Gallery in Lagos and has since gone on hiatus until his recent exhibition at the National Museum, Lagos. Perhaps the thirteen year hiatus has enabled him to observe, contemplate and solidify his socio-political commentaries. One of his bold socio-politically themed pieces at the exhibition, albeit satirical, is The Ineffectual Scarecrow , an acrylic on canvas piece cre

‘From Discards to Coveted’: The Changing Status of Fabrics

Mathew Oyedele  Samuel Nnorom's The Politics of Fabrics is an exhibition of works that were created during a one-month residency program at Guest Artists Space Foundation, Lagos, Nigeria.  For the first time in his career, the artist who lives and works in Nsukka, was able to create works in Lagos – the economic and cultural capital of Nigeria – with materials obtained from it. The exhibited pieces continued the artist's interest in narratives and subjects around fabrics but marked a stylistic departure from his previous explorations of ankara fabrics which are centered around the examination of social structure, social organisation, human condition, safe spaces, distribution and distance. The new work looks at imported second-hand clothes from the West and how they affect the development of our local textile industry. These second-hand clothes and cast-off fabrics have different names in Nigeria. While they are popularly known as Okrika , they are also known as Akube , Bend Do

HOW THREE NIGERIAN ARTISTS REACTED TO THE HAPPENINGS OF 2020.

Bob-Nosa, The Patriot, Acrylic on watercolour paper, 2020. Mathew Oyedele In a bid to curb and control the spread of coronavirus in 2020, the Nigerian government announced an indefinite lockdown that would reduce the transmission of the virus and protect the citizens. The lockdown restricted movements, halted business activities, and suspended all leisure, social and cultural activities. It did not leave out artists who usually work in isolation out of its wide-ranging impact. It came as a surprise to some of them. They could neither access their favourite materials nor replenish the exhausted ones. They were left with little or no income as galleries were closed; while exhibitions, auctions and art fairs were postponed. Artists had to rethink their approach to materials, subject matter and concepts in order to adapt to the changing environment. While the lockdown was gradually easing up, a youthful protest under the theme 'EndSARS' erupted on the streets of Nigeria to demand