You will follow the Rhein and compose play: Temitayo Ogunbiyi at Museum Tinguely
We visit the exhibition investigating the connections between Basel and Lagos...
November 15, 2023
Temitayo Ogunbiyi’s solo exhibition at Museum Tinguely in Switzerland draws out intercity connections, between Basel and Lagos. You will follow the Rhein and compose play is the first overview of the artist’s practice produced between 2016 to now; and though diverse in media, themes and motifs recur. Running through her multidisciplinary practice are curves and lines, the methods Ogunbiyi uses to articulate travel and trade routes between cities, and the global flows of people and goods.
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Inside, it commences with ‘Healing Verb’ (2023), a collection of foodstuffs sourced from Basel’s supermarkets that cater to specific communities. From her own Nigerian background, she includes dried mangoes, papaya, and ginger, goods used to restore health - and here, perhaps, nourish those in the diaspora with a taste of home. In collaboration with a Lagossian friend and fellow migrant, as well as the local Papermühle, she also produces a recipe card for a Welcome Fondue, creating a wholly new food which connects Nigeria and Switzerland.
Food, and music, often feature as both subject and material; indeed, Ogunbiyi’s practice overlaps with that of Emeka Ogboh, another artist who has migrated from Lagos to Europe, and exhibited with Ogunbiyi at South London Gallery’s recent Lagos, Peckham, Repeat. Whilst best known for his audio work, he also collaborated with the south London brewery Orbit to create a new beer for Lagos, Peckham, Repeat, recreating individuals’ hybrid identities with African chilli peppers and English hops.
Ogunbiyi’s titular piece travels from the taste of migration to its sounds: woks provide the shape of the pedestals and seats of her ‘musical instrument’. The base is made of a series of baking pans, sculpted out of yellow Numidian marble, sourced from a Roman quarry between Tunisia and Algeria. The locale is also the source of the olive wood used for the gugelhupf, a material and instrument which recreates connections between southern Europe, the Mediterranean, and the northern African continent.
In Basel, Ogunbiyi found cooking utensils in second-hand stores and supermarkets, wooden utensils which double up as drumsticks. Here, they are used to activate the installation, with live performances by local percussion students (recorded for those absent, another mark of the artist’s commitment to sustainable, durable practice). The artist’s ‘reappropriations’ across media speak to migration, and how a city might perform cosmopolitanism.
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‘You will follow the Rhein and compose play’ uses brass, steel, and bronze curved rods, more pathways between African and European cities. These materials are used in the artist’s interactive play structures, but with a straightforward connection to Lagos. Outside, in the nearby Solitude Park, sits Ogunbiyi’s sculpture of steel poles, borrowed from homemade gyms in Nigeria.
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Curves come too; wrapped manila rope speaks to her interest in plant structures, and ‘complex’ threaded Nigerian hairstyles, like ogun pari. The style, meaning the war is over, in the Yoruba language became popular after the Biafran or Nigerian Civil War (-1968), a more particular means of reconnecting after ethnic conflict.
Ogunbiyi also takes care, and pleasure, in the everyday, decorating the rubber mats necessary for children’s safety with one of her signature motifs. It is intended to draw attention to regulations and coded behaviours around play, and perhaps too, around museum spaces - but it’s also simply beautiful to behold.
Though large-scale and sculptural, the exhibition is carried by its smallness. Works on paper capture their interdisciplinary interests. Using lines that mimic strands of human hair, Ogunbiyi draws edible plants observed in Basel’s museums, their botanical details reproduced on herbarium paper. Not only does this reinforce the importance of drawing to the practice of sculpture – a continual effort undertaken by the likes of the Henry Moore Institute in Leeds – but also the artist’s apparent interest in sustainability. In her sculptures, many of the materials are found or recycled, and the architecture is designed to be deconstructed and repurposed.
These works on paper also bear the artist’s most instructive titles: ‘You will find peace and play among palm trees (Freedom Park)’ (2018) is a command which takes the player back to Lagos. Indeed, this exhibition, in collaboration with Culturescapes 2023, focuses on the Saharan space as one where reconnecting and reimagining Africa is possible. A promising nod to Ogunbiyi’s next major exhibition - hopefully, on the continent - too.
Temitayo Ogunbiyi: You will follow the Rhein and compose play is on view at the Museum Tinguely in Basel until 14 January 2024.
Temitayo Ogunbiyi’s solo exhibition at Museum Tinguely in Switzerland draws out intercity connections, between Basel and Lagos. You will follow the Rhein and compose play is the first overview of the artist’s practice produced between 2016 to now; and though diverse in media, themes and motifs recur. Running through her multidisciplinary practice are curves and lines, the methods Ogunbiyi uses to articulate travel and trade routes between cities, and the global flows of people and goods.
Inside, it commences with ‘Healing Verb’ (2023), a collection of foodstuffs sourced from Basel’s supermarkets that cater to specific communities. From her own Nigerian background, she includes dried mangoes, papaya, and ginger, goods used to restore health - and here, perhaps, nourish those in the diaspora with a taste of home. In collaboration with a Lagossian friend and fellow migrant, as well as the local Papermühle, she also produces a recipe card for a Welcome Fondue, creating a wholly new food which connects Nigeria and Switzerland.
Food, and music, often feature as both subject and material; indeed, Ogunbiyi’s practice overlaps with that of Emeka Ogboh, another artist who has migrated from Lagos to Europe, and exhibited with Ogunbiyi at South London Gallery’s recent Lagos, Peckham, Repeat. Whilst best known for his audio work, he also collaborated with the south London brewery Orbit to create a new beer for Lagos, Peckham, Repeat, recreating individuals’ hybrid identities with African chilli peppers and English hops.
Ogunbiyi’s titular piece travels from the taste of migration to its sounds: woks provide the shape of the pedestals and seats of her ‘musical instrument’. The base is made of a series of baking pans, sculpted out of yellow Numidian marble, sourced from a Roman quarry between Tunisia and Algeria. The locale is also the source of the olive wood used for the gugelhupf, a material and instrument which recreates connections between southern Europe, the Mediterranean, and the northern African continent.
In Basel, Ogunbiyi found cooking utensils in second-hand stores and supermarkets, wooden utensils which double up as drumsticks. Here, they are used to activate the installation, with live performances by local percussion students (recorded for those absent, another mark of the artist’s commitment to sustainable, durable practice). The artist’s ‘reappropriations’ across media speak to migration, and how a city might perform cosmopolitanism.
‘You will follow the Rhein and compose play’ uses brass, steel, and bronze curved rods, more pathways between African and European cities. These materials are used in the artist’s interactive play structures, but with a straightforward connection to Lagos. Outside, in the nearby Solitude Park, sits Ogunbiyi’s sculpture of steel poles, borrowed from homemade gyms in Nigeria.
Curves come too; wrapped manila rope speaks to her interest in plant structures, and ‘complex’ threaded Nigerian hairstyles, like ogun pari. The style, meaning the war is over, in the Yoruba language became popular after the Biafran or Nigerian Civil War (-1968), a more particular means of reconnecting after ethnic conflict.
Ogunbiyi also takes care, and pleasure, in the everyday, decorating the rubber mats necessary for children’s safety with one of her signature motifs. It is intended to draw attention to regulations and coded behaviours around play, and perhaps too, around museum spaces - but it’s also simply beautiful to behold.
Though large-scale and sculptural, the exhibition is carried by its smallness. Works on paper capture their interdisciplinary interests. Using lines that mimic strands of human hair, Ogunbiyi draws edible plants observed in Basel’s museums, their botanical details reproduced on herbarium paper. Not only does this reinforce the importance of drawing to the practice of sculpture – a continual effort undertaken by the likes of the Henry Moore Institute in Leeds – but also the artist’s apparent interest in sustainability. In her sculptures, many of the materials are found or recycled, and the architecture is designed to be deconstructed and repurposed.
These works on paper also bear the artist’s most instructive titles: ‘You will find peace and play among palm trees (Freedom Park)’ (2018) is a command which takes the player back to Lagos. Indeed, this exhibition, in collaboration with Culturescapes 2023, focuses on the Saharan space as one where reconnecting and reimagining Africa is possible. A promising nod to Ogunbiyi’s next major exhibition - hopefully, on the continent - too.
Temitayo Ogunbiyi: You will follow the Rhein and compose play is on view at the Museum Tinguely in Basel until 14 January 2024.
Temitayo Ogunbiyi’s solo exhibition at Museum Tinguely in Switzerland draws out intercity connections, between Basel and Lagos. You will follow the Rhein and compose play is the first overview of the artist’s practice produced between 2016 to now; and though diverse in media, themes and motifs recur. Running through her multidisciplinary practice are curves and lines, the methods Ogunbiyi uses to articulate travel and trade routes between cities, and the global flows of people and goods.
Inside, it commences with ‘Healing Verb’ (2023), a collection of foodstuffs sourced from Basel’s supermarkets that cater to specific communities. From her own Nigerian background, she includes dried mangoes, papaya, and ginger, goods used to restore health - and here, perhaps, nourish those in the diaspora with a taste of home. In collaboration with a Lagossian friend and fellow migrant, as well as the local Papermühle, she also produces a recipe card for a Welcome Fondue, creating a wholly new food which connects Nigeria and Switzerland.
Food, and music, often feature as both subject and material; indeed, Ogunbiyi’s practice overlaps with that of Emeka Ogboh, another artist who has migrated from Lagos to Europe, and exhibited with Ogunbiyi at South London Gallery’s recent Lagos, Peckham, Repeat. Whilst best known for his audio work, he also collaborated with the south London brewery Orbit to create a new beer for Lagos, Peckham, Repeat, recreating individuals’ hybrid identities with African chilli peppers and English hops.
Ogunbiyi’s titular piece travels from the taste of migration to its sounds: woks provide the shape of the pedestals and seats of her ‘musical instrument’. The base is made of a series of baking pans, sculpted out of yellow Numidian marble, sourced from a Roman quarry between Tunisia and Algeria. The locale is also the source of the olive wood used for the gugelhupf, a material and instrument which recreates connections between southern Europe, the Mediterranean, and the northern African continent.
In Basel, Ogunbiyi found cooking utensils in second-hand stores and supermarkets, wooden utensils which double up as drumsticks. Here, they are used to activate the installation, with live performances by local percussion students (recorded for those absent, another mark of the artist’s commitment to sustainable, durable practice). The artist’s ‘reappropriations’ across media speak to migration, and how a city might perform cosmopolitanism.
‘You will follow the Rhein and compose play’ uses brass, steel, and bronze curved rods, more pathways between African and European cities. These materials are used in the artist’s interactive play structures, but with a straightforward connection to Lagos. Outside, in the nearby Solitude Park, sits Ogunbiyi’s sculpture of steel poles, borrowed from homemade gyms in Nigeria.
Curves come too; wrapped manila rope speaks to her interest in plant structures, and ‘complex’ threaded Nigerian hairstyles, like ogun pari. The style, meaning the war is over, in the Yoruba language became popular after the Biafran or Nigerian Civil War (-1968), a more particular means of reconnecting after ethnic conflict.
Ogunbiyi also takes care, and pleasure, in the everyday, decorating the rubber mats necessary for children’s safety with one of her signature motifs. It is intended to draw attention to regulations and coded behaviours around play, and perhaps too, around museum spaces - but it’s also simply beautiful to behold.
Though large-scale and sculptural, the exhibition is carried by its smallness. Works on paper capture their interdisciplinary interests. Using lines that mimic strands of human hair, Ogunbiyi draws edible plants observed in Basel’s museums, their botanical details reproduced on herbarium paper. Not only does this reinforce the importance of drawing to the practice of sculpture – a continual effort undertaken by the likes of the Henry Moore Institute in Leeds – but also the artist’s apparent interest in sustainability. In her sculptures, many of the materials are found or recycled, and the architecture is designed to be deconstructed and repurposed.
These works on paper also bear the artist’s most instructive titles: ‘You will find peace and play among palm trees (Freedom Park)’ (2018) is a command which takes the player back to Lagos. Indeed, this exhibition, in collaboration with Culturescapes 2023, focuses on the Saharan space as one where reconnecting and reimagining Africa is possible. A promising nod to Ogunbiyi’s next major exhibition - hopefully, on the continent - too.
Temitayo Ogunbiyi: You will follow the Rhein and compose play is on view at the Museum Tinguely in Basel until 14 January 2024.
Temitayo Ogunbiyi’s solo exhibition at Museum Tinguely in Switzerland draws out intercity connections, between Basel and Lagos. You will follow the Rhein and compose play is the first overview of the artist’s practice produced between 2016 to now; and though diverse in media, themes and motifs recur. Running through her multidisciplinary practice are curves and lines, the methods Ogunbiyi uses to articulate travel and trade routes between cities, and the global flows of people and goods.
Inside, it commences with ‘Healing Verb’ (2023), a collection of foodstuffs sourced from Basel’s supermarkets that cater to specific communities. From her own Nigerian background, she includes dried mangoes, papaya, and ginger, goods used to restore health - and here, perhaps, nourish those in the diaspora with a taste of home. In collaboration with a Lagossian friend and fellow migrant, as well as the local Papermühle, she also produces a recipe card for a Welcome Fondue, creating a wholly new food which connects Nigeria and Switzerland.
Food, and music, often feature as both subject and material; indeed, Ogunbiyi’s practice overlaps with that of Emeka Ogboh, another artist who has migrated from Lagos to Europe, and exhibited with Ogunbiyi at South London Gallery’s recent Lagos, Peckham, Repeat. Whilst best known for his audio work, he also collaborated with the south London brewery Orbit to create a new beer for Lagos, Peckham, Repeat, recreating individuals’ hybrid identities with African chilli peppers and English hops.
Ogunbiyi’s titular piece travels from the taste of migration to its sounds: woks provide the shape of the pedestals and seats of her ‘musical instrument’. The base is made of a series of baking pans, sculpted out of yellow Numidian marble, sourced from a Roman quarry between Tunisia and Algeria. The locale is also the source of the olive wood used for the gugelhupf, a material and instrument which recreates connections between southern Europe, the Mediterranean, and the northern African continent.
In Basel, Ogunbiyi found cooking utensils in second-hand stores and supermarkets, wooden utensils which double up as drumsticks. Here, they are used to activate the installation, with live performances by local percussion students (recorded for those absent, another mark of the artist’s commitment to sustainable, durable practice). The artist’s ‘reappropriations’ across media speak to migration, and how a city might perform cosmopolitanism.
‘You will follow the Rhein and compose play’ uses brass, steel, and bronze curved rods, more pathways between African and European cities. These materials are used in the artist’s interactive play structures, but with a straightforward connection to Lagos. Outside, in the nearby Solitude Park, sits Ogunbiyi’s sculpture of steel poles, borrowed from homemade gyms in Nigeria.
Curves come too; wrapped manila rope speaks to her interest in plant structures, and ‘complex’ threaded Nigerian hairstyles, like ogun pari. The style, meaning the war is over, in the Yoruba language became popular after the Biafran or Nigerian Civil War (-1968), a more particular means of reconnecting after ethnic conflict.
Ogunbiyi also takes care, and pleasure, in the everyday, decorating the rubber mats necessary for children’s safety with one of her signature motifs. It is intended to draw attention to regulations and coded behaviours around play, and perhaps too, around museum spaces - but it’s also simply beautiful to behold.
Though large-scale and sculptural, the exhibition is carried by its smallness. Works on paper capture their interdisciplinary interests. Using lines that mimic strands of human hair, Ogunbiyi draws edible plants observed in Basel’s museums, their botanical details reproduced on herbarium paper. Not only does this reinforce the importance of drawing to the practice of sculpture – a continual effort undertaken by the likes of the Henry Moore Institute in Leeds – but also the artist’s apparent interest in sustainability. In her sculptures, many of the materials are found or recycled, and the architecture is designed to be deconstructed and repurposed.
These works on paper also bear the artist’s most instructive titles: ‘You will find peace and play among palm trees (Freedom Park)’ (2018) is a command which takes the player back to Lagos. Indeed, this exhibition, in collaboration with Culturescapes 2023, focuses on the Saharan space as one where reconnecting and reimagining Africa is possible. A promising nod to Ogunbiyi’s next major exhibition - hopefully, on the continent - too.
Temitayo Ogunbiyi: You will follow the Rhein and compose play is on view at the Museum Tinguely in Basel until 14 January 2024.
Temitayo Ogunbiyi’s solo exhibition at Museum Tinguely in Switzerland draws out intercity connections, between Basel and Lagos. You will follow the Rhein and compose play is the first overview of the artist’s practice produced between 2016 to now; and though diverse in media, themes and motifs recur. Running through her multidisciplinary practice are curves and lines, the methods Ogunbiyi uses to articulate travel and trade routes between cities, and the global flows of people and goods.
Inside, it commences with ‘Healing Verb’ (2023), a collection of foodstuffs sourced from Basel’s supermarkets that cater to specific communities. From her own Nigerian background, she includes dried mangoes, papaya, and ginger, goods used to restore health - and here, perhaps, nourish those in the diaspora with a taste of home. In collaboration with a Lagossian friend and fellow migrant, as well as the local Papermühle, she also produces a recipe card for a Welcome Fondue, creating a wholly new food which connects Nigeria and Switzerland.
Food, and music, often feature as both subject and material; indeed, Ogunbiyi’s practice overlaps with that of Emeka Ogboh, another artist who has migrated from Lagos to Europe, and exhibited with Ogunbiyi at South London Gallery’s recent Lagos, Peckham, Repeat. Whilst best known for his audio work, he also collaborated with the south London brewery Orbit to create a new beer for Lagos, Peckham, Repeat, recreating individuals’ hybrid identities with African chilli peppers and English hops.
Ogunbiyi’s titular piece travels from the taste of migration to its sounds: woks provide the shape of the pedestals and seats of her ‘musical instrument’. The base is made of a series of baking pans, sculpted out of yellow Numidian marble, sourced from a Roman quarry between Tunisia and Algeria. The locale is also the source of the olive wood used for the gugelhupf, a material and instrument which recreates connections between southern Europe, the Mediterranean, and the northern African continent.
In Basel, Ogunbiyi found cooking utensils in second-hand stores and supermarkets, wooden utensils which double up as drumsticks. Here, they are used to activate the installation, with live performances by local percussion students (recorded for those absent, another mark of the artist’s commitment to sustainable, durable practice). The artist’s ‘reappropriations’ across media speak to migration, and how a city might perform cosmopolitanism.
‘You will follow the Rhein and compose play’ uses brass, steel, and bronze curved rods, more pathways between African and European cities. These materials are used in the artist’s interactive play structures, but with a straightforward connection to Lagos. Outside, in the nearby Solitude Park, sits Ogunbiyi’s sculpture of steel poles, borrowed from homemade gyms in Nigeria.
Curves come too; wrapped manila rope speaks to her interest in plant structures, and ‘complex’ threaded Nigerian hairstyles, like ogun pari. The style, meaning the war is over, in the Yoruba language became popular after the Biafran or Nigerian Civil War (-1968), a more particular means of reconnecting after ethnic conflict.
Ogunbiyi also takes care, and pleasure, in the everyday, decorating the rubber mats necessary for children’s safety with one of her signature motifs. It is intended to draw attention to regulations and coded behaviours around play, and perhaps too, around museum spaces - but it’s also simply beautiful to behold.
Though large-scale and sculptural, the exhibition is carried by its smallness. Works on paper capture their interdisciplinary interests. Using lines that mimic strands of human hair, Ogunbiyi draws edible plants observed in Basel’s museums, their botanical details reproduced on herbarium paper. Not only does this reinforce the importance of drawing to the practice of sculpture – a continual effort undertaken by the likes of the Henry Moore Institute in Leeds – but also the artist’s apparent interest in sustainability. In her sculptures, many of the materials are found or recycled, and the architecture is designed to be deconstructed and repurposed.
These works on paper also bear the artist’s most instructive titles: ‘You will find peace and play among palm trees (Freedom Park)’ (2018) is a command which takes the player back to Lagos. Indeed, this exhibition, in collaboration with Culturescapes 2023, focuses on the Saharan space as one where reconnecting and reimagining Africa is possible. A promising nod to Ogunbiyi’s next major exhibition - hopefully, on the continent - too.
Temitayo Ogunbiyi: You will follow the Rhein and compose play is on view at the Museum Tinguely in Basel until 14 January 2024.
Temitayo Ogunbiyi’s solo exhibition at Museum Tinguely in Switzerland draws out intercity connections, between Basel and Lagos. You will follow the Rhein and compose play is the first overview of the artist’s practice produced between 2016 to now; and though diverse in media, themes and motifs recur. Running through her multidisciplinary practice are curves and lines, the methods Ogunbiyi uses to articulate travel and trade routes between cities, and the global flows of people and goods.
Inside, it commences with ‘Healing Verb’ (2023), a collection of foodstuffs sourced from Basel’s supermarkets that cater to specific communities. From her own Nigerian background, she includes dried mangoes, papaya, and ginger, goods used to restore health - and here, perhaps, nourish those in the diaspora with a taste of home. In collaboration with a Lagossian friend and fellow migrant, as well as the local Papermühle, she also produces a recipe card for a Welcome Fondue, creating a wholly new food which connects Nigeria and Switzerland.
Food, and music, often feature as both subject and material; indeed, Ogunbiyi’s practice overlaps with that of Emeka Ogboh, another artist who has migrated from Lagos to Europe, and exhibited with Ogunbiyi at South London Gallery’s recent Lagos, Peckham, Repeat. Whilst best known for his audio work, he also collaborated with the south London brewery Orbit to create a new beer for Lagos, Peckham, Repeat, recreating individuals’ hybrid identities with African chilli peppers and English hops.
Ogunbiyi’s titular piece travels from the taste of migration to its sounds: woks provide the shape of the pedestals and seats of her ‘musical instrument’. The base is made of a series of baking pans, sculpted out of yellow Numidian marble, sourced from a Roman quarry between Tunisia and Algeria. The locale is also the source of the olive wood used for the gugelhupf, a material and instrument which recreates connections between southern Europe, the Mediterranean, and the northern African continent.
In Basel, Ogunbiyi found cooking utensils in second-hand stores and supermarkets, wooden utensils which double up as drumsticks. Here, they are used to activate the installation, with live performances by local percussion students (recorded for those absent, another mark of the artist’s commitment to sustainable, durable practice). The artist’s ‘reappropriations’ across media speak to migration, and how a city might perform cosmopolitanism.
‘You will follow the Rhein and compose play’ uses brass, steel, and bronze curved rods, more pathways between African and European cities. These materials are used in the artist’s interactive play structures, but with a straightforward connection to Lagos. Outside, in the nearby Solitude Park, sits Ogunbiyi’s sculpture of steel poles, borrowed from homemade gyms in Nigeria.
Curves come too; wrapped manila rope speaks to her interest in plant structures, and ‘complex’ threaded Nigerian hairstyles, like ogun pari. The style, meaning the war is over, in the Yoruba language became popular after the Biafran or Nigerian Civil War (-1968), a more particular means of reconnecting after ethnic conflict.
Ogunbiyi also takes care, and pleasure, in the everyday, decorating the rubber mats necessary for children’s safety with one of her signature motifs. It is intended to draw attention to regulations and coded behaviours around play, and perhaps too, around museum spaces - but it’s also simply beautiful to behold.
Though large-scale and sculptural, the exhibition is carried by its smallness. Works on paper capture their interdisciplinary interests. Using lines that mimic strands of human hair, Ogunbiyi draws edible plants observed in Basel’s museums, their botanical details reproduced on herbarium paper. Not only does this reinforce the importance of drawing to the practice of sculpture – a continual effort undertaken by the likes of the Henry Moore Institute in Leeds – but also the artist’s apparent interest in sustainability. In her sculptures, many of the materials are found or recycled, and the architecture is designed to be deconstructed and repurposed.
These works on paper also bear the artist’s most instructive titles: ‘You will find peace and play among palm trees (Freedom Park)’ (2018) is a command which takes the player back to Lagos. Indeed, this exhibition, in collaboration with Culturescapes 2023, focuses on the Saharan space as one where reconnecting and reimagining Africa is possible. A promising nod to Ogunbiyi’s next major exhibition - hopefully, on the continent - too.
Temitayo Ogunbiyi: You will follow the Rhein and compose play is on view at the Museum Tinguely in Basel until 14 January 2024.
Temitayo Ogunbiyi’s solo exhibition at Museum Tinguely in Switzerland draws out intercity connections, between Basel and Lagos. You will follow the Rhein and compose play is the first overview of the artist’s practice produced between 2016 to now; and though diverse in media, themes and motifs recur. Running through her multidisciplinary practice are curves and lines, the methods Ogunbiyi uses to articulate travel and trade routes between cities, and the global flows of people and goods.
Inside, it commences with ‘Healing Verb’ (2023), a collection of foodstuffs sourced from Basel’s supermarkets that cater to specific communities. From her own Nigerian background, she includes dried mangoes, papaya, and ginger, goods used to restore health - and here, perhaps, nourish those in the diaspora with a taste of home. In collaboration with a Lagossian friend and fellow migrant, as well as the local Papermühle, she also produces a recipe card for a Welcome Fondue, creating a wholly new food which connects Nigeria and Switzerland.
Food, and music, often feature as both subject and material; indeed, Ogunbiyi’s practice overlaps with that of Emeka Ogboh, another artist who has migrated from Lagos to Europe, and exhibited with Ogunbiyi at South London Gallery’s recent Lagos, Peckham, Repeat. Whilst best known for his audio work, he also collaborated with the south London brewery Orbit to create a new beer for Lagos, Peckham, Repeat, recreating individuals’ hybrid identities with African chilli peppers and English hops.
Ogunbiyi’s titular piece travels from the taste of migration to its sounds: woks provide the shape of the pedestals and seats of her ‘musical instrument’. The base is made of a series of baking pans, sculpted out of yellow Numidian marble, sourced from a Roman quarry between Tunisia and Algeria. The locale is also the source of the olive wood used for the gugelhupf, a material and instrument which recreates connections between southern Europe, the Mediterranean, and the northern African continent.
In Basel, Ogunbiyi found cooking utensils in second-hand stores and supermarkets, wooden utensils which double up as drumsticks. Here, they are used to activate the installation, with live performances by local percussion students (recorded for those absent, another mark of the artist’s commitment to sustainable, durable practice). The artist’s ‘reappropriations’ across media speak to migration, and how a city might perform cosmopolitanism.
‘You will follow the Rhein and compose play’ uses brass, steel, and bronze curved rods, more pathways between African and European cities. These materials are used in the artist’s interactive play structures, but with a straightforward connection to Lagos. Outside, in the nearby Solitude Park, sits Ogunbiyi’s sculpture of steel poles, borrowed from homemade gyms in Nigeria.
Curves come too; wrapped manila rope speaks to her interest in plant structures, and ‘complex’ threaded Nigerian hairstyles, like ogun pari. The style, meaning the war is over, in the Yoruba language became popular after the Biafran or Nigerian Civil War (-1968), a more particular means of reconnecting after ethnic conflict.
Ogunbiyi also takes care, and pleasure, in the everyday, decorating the rubber mats necessary for children’s safety with one of her signature motifs. It is intended to draw attention to regulations and coded behaviours around play, and perhaps too, around museum spaces - but it’s also simply beautiful to behold.
Though large-scale and sculptural, the exhibition is carried by its smallness. Works on paper capture their interdisciplinary interests. Using lines that mimic strands of human hair, Ogunbiyi draws edible plants observed in Basel’s museums, their botanical details reproduced on herbarium paper. Not only does this reinforce the importance of drawing to the practice of sculpture – a continual effort undertaken by the likes of the Henry Moore Institute in Leeds – but also the artist’s apparent interest in sustainability. In her sculptures, many of the materials are found or recycled, and the architecture is designed to be deconstructed and repurposed.
These works on paper also bear the artist’s most instructive titles: ‘You will find peace and play among palm trees (Freedom Park)’ (2018) is a command which takes the player back to Lagos. Indeed, this exhibition, in collaboration with Culturescapes 2023, focuses on the Saharan space as one where reconnecting and reimagining Africa is possible. A promising nod to Ogunbiyi’s next major exhibition - hopefully, on the continent - too.
Temitayo Ogunbiyi: You will follow the Rhein and compose play is on view at the Museum Tinguely in Basel until 14 January 2024.
Temitayo Ogunbiyi’s solo exhibition at Museum Tinguely in Switzerland draws out intercity connections, between Basel and Lagos. You will follow the Rhein and compose play is the first overview of the artist’s practice produced between 2016 to now; and though diverse in media, themes and motifs recur. Running through her multidisciplinary practice are curves and lines, the methods Ogunbiyi uses to articulate travel and trade routes between cities, and the global flows of people and goods.
Inside, it commences with ‘Healing Verb’ (2023), a collection of foodstuffs sourced from Basel’s supermarkets that cater to specific communities. From her own Nigerian background, she includes dried mangoes, papaya, and ginger, goods used to restore health - and here, perhaps, nourish those in the diaspora with a taste of home. In collaboration with a Lagossian friend and fellow migrant, as well as the local Papermühle, she also produces a recipe card for a Welcome Fondue, creating a wholly new food which connects Nigeria and Switzerland.
Food, and music, often feature as both subject and material; indeed, Ogunbiyi’s practice overlaps with that of Emeka Ogboh, another artist who has migrated from Lagos to Europe, and exhibited with Ogunbiyi at South London Gallery’s recent Lagos, Peckham, Repeat. Whilst best known for his audio work, he also collaborated with the south London brewery Orbit to create a new beer for Lagos, Peckham, Repeat, recreating individuals’ hybrid identities with African chilli peppers and English hops.
Ogunbiyi’s titular piece travels from the taste of migration to its sounds: woks provide the shape of the pedestals and seats of her ‘musical instrument’. The base is made of a series of baking pans, sculpted out of yellow Numidian marble, sourced from a Roman quarry between Tunisia and Algeria. The locale is also the source of the olive wood used for the gugelhupf, a material and instrument which recreates connections between southern Europe, the Mediterranean, and the northern African continent.
In Basel, Ogunbiyi found cooking utensils in second-hand stores and supermarkets, wooden utensils which double up as drumsticks. Here, they are used to activate the installation, with live performances by local percussion students (recorded for those absent, another mark of the artist’s commitment to sustainable, durable practice). The artist’s ‘reappropriations’ across media speak to migration, and how a city might perform cosmopolitanism.
‘You will follow the Rhein and compose play’ uses brass, steel, and bronze curved rods, more pathways between African and European cities. These materials are used in the artist’s interactive play structures, but with a straightforward connection to Lagos. Outside, in the nearby Solitude Park, sits Ogunbiyi’s sculpture of steel poles, borrowed from homemade gyms in Nigeria.
Curves come too; wrapped manila rope speaks to her interest in plant structures, and ‘complex’ threaded Nigerian hairstyles, like ogun pari. The style, meaning the war is over, in the Yoruba language became popular after the Biafran or Nigerian Civil War (-1968), a more particular means of reconnecting after ethnic conflict.
Ogunbiyi also takes care, and pleasure, in the everyday, decorating the rubber mats necessary for children’s safety with one of her signature motifs. It is intended to draw attention to regulations and coded behaviours around play, and perhaps too, around museum spaces - but it’s also simply beautiful to behold.
Though large-scale and sculptural, the exhibition is carried by its smallness. Works on paper capture their interdisciplinary interests. Using lines that mimic strands of human hair, Ogunbiyi draws edible plants observed in Basel’s museums, their botanical details reproduced on herbarium paper. Not only does this reinforce the importance of drawing to the practice of sculpture – a continual effort undertaken by the likes of the Henry Moore Institute in Leeds – but also the artist’s apparent interest in sustainability. In her sculptures, many of the materials are found or recycled, and the architecture is designed to be deconstructed and repurposed.
These works on paper also bear the artist’s most instructive titles: ‘You will find peace and play among palm trees (Freedom Park)’ (2018) is a command which takes the player back to Lagos. Indeed, this exhibition, in collaboration with Culturescapes 2023, focuses on the Saharan space as one where reconnecting and reimagining Africa is possible. A promising nod to Ogunbiyi’s next major exhibition - hopefully, on the continent - too.
Temitayo Ogunbiyi: You will follow the Rhein and compose play is on view at the Museum Tinguely in Basel until 14 January 2024.
Temitayo Ogunbiyi’s solo exhibition at Museum Tinguely in Switzerland draws out intercity connections, between Basel and Lagos. You will follow the Rhein and compose play is the first overview of the artist’s practice produced between 2016 to now; and though diverse in media, themes and motifs recur. Running through her multidisciplinary practice are curves and lines, the methods Ogunbiyi uses to articulate travel and trade routes between cities, and the global flows of people and goods.
Inside, it commences with ‘Healing Verb’ (2023), a collection of foodstuffs sourced from Basel’s supermarkets that cater to specific communities. From her own Nigerian background, she includes dried mangoes, papaya, and ginger, goods used to restore health - and here, perhaps, nourish those in the diaspora with a taste of home. In collaboration with a Lagossian friend and fellow migrant, as well as the local Papermühle, she also produces a recipe card for a Welcome Fondue, creating a wholly new food which connects Nigeria and Switzerland.
Food, and music, often feature as both subject and material; indeed, Ogunbiyi’s practice overlaps with that of Emeka Ogboh, another artist who has migrated from Lagos to Europe, and exhibited with Ogunbiyi at South London Gallery’s recent Lagos, Peckham, Repeat. Whilst best known for his audio work, he also collaborated with the south London brewery Orbit to create a new beer for Lagos, Peckham, Repeat, recreating individuals’ hybrid identities with African chilli peppers and English hops.
Ogunbiyi’s titular piece travels from the taste of migration to its sounds: woks provide the shape of the pedestals and seats of her ‘musical instrument’. The base is made of a series of baking pans, sculpted out of yellow Numidian marble, sourced from a Roman quarry between Tunisia and Algeria. The locale is also the source of the olive wood used for the gugelhupf, a material and instrument which recreates connections between southern Europe, the Mediterranean, and the northern African continent.
In Basel, Ogunbiyi found cooking utensils in second-hand stores and supermarkets, wooden utensils which double up as drumsticks. Here, they are used to activate the installation, with live performances by local percussion students (recorded for those absent, another mark of the artist’s commitment to sustainable, durable practice). The artist’s ‘reappropriations’ across media speak to migration, and how a city might perform cosmopolitanism.
‘You will follow the Rhein and compose play’ uses brass, steel, and bronze curved rods, more pathways between African and European cities. These materials are used in the artist’s interactive play structures, but with a straightforward connection to Lagos. Outside, in the nearby Solitude Park, sits Ogunbiyi’s sculpture of steel poles, borrowed from homemade gyms in Nigeria.
Curves come too; wrapped manila rope speaks to her interest in plant structures, and ‘complex’ threaded Nigerian hairstyles, like ogun pari. The style, meaning the war is over, in the Yoruba language became popular after the Biafran or Nigerian Civil War (-1968), a more particular means of reconnecting after ethnic conflict.
Ogunbiyi also takes care, and pleasure, in the everyday, decorating the rubber mats necessary for children’s safety with one of her signature motifs. It is intended to draw attention to regulations and coded behaviours around play, and perhaps too, around museum spaces - but it’s also simply beautiful to behold.
Though large-scale and sculptural, the exhibition is carried by its smallness. Works on paper capture their interdisciplinary interests. Using lines that mimic strands of human hair, Ogunbiyi draws edible plants observed in Basel’s museums, their botanical details reproduced on herbarium paper. Not only does this reinforce the importance of drawing to the practice of sculpture – a continual effort undertaken by the likes of the Henry Moore Institute in Leeds – but also the artist’s apparent interest in sustainability. In her sculptures, many of the materials are found or recycled, and the architecture is designed to be deconstructed and repurposed.
These works on paper also bear the artist’s most instructive titles: ‘You will find peace and play among palm trees (Freedom Park)’ (2018) is a command which takes the player back to Lagos. Indeed, this exhibition, in collaboration with Culturescapes 2023, focuses on the Saharan space as one where reconnecting and reimagining Africa is possible. A promising nod to Ogunbiyi’s next major exhibition - hopefully, on the continent - too.
Temitayo Ogunbiyi: You will follow the Rhein and compose play is on view at the Museum Tinguely in Basel until 14 January 2024.
Temitayo Ogunbiyi’s solo exhibition at Museum Tinguely in Switzerland draws out intercity connections, between Basel and Lagos. You will follow the Rhein and compose play is the first overview of the artist’s practice produced between 2016 to now; and though diverse in media, themes and motifs recur. Running through her multidisciplinary practice are curves and lines, the methods Ogunbiyi uses to articulate travel and trade routes between cities, and the global flows of people and goods.
Inside, it commences with ‘Healing Verb’ (2023), a collection of foodstuffs sourced from Basel’s supermarkets that cater to specific communities. From her own Nigerian background, she includes dried mangoes, papaya, and ginger, goods used to restore health - and here, perhaps, nourish those in the diaspora with a taste of home. In collaboration with a Lagossian friend and fellow migrant, as well as the local Papermühle, she also produces a recipe card for a Welcome Fondue, creating a wholly new food which connects Nigeria and Switzerland.
Food, and music, often feature as both subject and material; indeed, Ogunbiyi’s practice overlaps with that of Emeka Ogboh, another artist who has migrated from Lagos to Europe, and exhibited with Ogunbiyi at South London Gallery’s recent Lagos, Peckham, Repeat. Whilst best known for his audio work, he also collaborated with the south London brewery Orbit to create a new beer for Lagos, Peckham, Repeat, recreating individuals’ hybrid identities with African chilli peppers and English hops.
Ogunbiyi’s titular piece travels from the taste of migration to its sounds: woks provide the shape of the pedestals and seats of her ‘musical instrument’. The base is made of a series of baking pans, sculpted out of yellow Numidian marble, sourced from a Roman quarry between Tunisia and Algeria. The locale is also the source of the olive wood used for the gugelhupf, a material and instrument which recreates connections between southern Europe, the Mediterranean, and the northern African continent.
In Basel, Ogunbiyi found cooking utensils in second-hand stores and supermarkets, wooden utensils which double up as drumsticks. Here, they are used to activate the installation, with live performances by local percussion students (recorded for those absent, another mark of the artist’s commitment to sustainable, durable practice). The artist’s ‘reappropriations’ across media speak to migration, and how a city might perform cosmopolitanism.
‘You will follow the Rhein and compose play’ uses brass, steel, and bronze curved rods, more pathways between African and European cities. These materials are used in the artist’s interactive play structures, but with a straightforward connection to Lagos. Outside, in the nearby Solitude Park, sits Ogunbiyi’s sculpture of steel poles, borrowed from homemade gyms in Nigeria.
Curves come too; wrapped manila rope speaks to her interest in plant structures, and ‘complex’ threaded Nigerian hairstyles, like ogun pari. The style, meaning the war is over, in the Yoruba language became popular after the Biafran or Nigerian Civil War (-1968), a more particular means of reconnecting after ethnic conflict.
Ogunbiyi also takes care, and pleasure, in the everyday, decorating the rubber mats necessary for children’s safety with one of her signature motifs. It is intended to draw attention to regulations and coded behaviours around play, and perhaps too, around museum spaces - but it’s also simply beautiful to behold.
Though large-scale and sculptural, the exhibition is carried by its smallness. Works on paper capture their interdisciplinary interests. Using lines that mimic strands of human hair, Ogunbiyi draws edible plants observed in Basel’s museums, their botanical details reproduced on herbarium paper. Not only does this reinforce the importance of drawing to the practice of sculpture – a continual effort undertaken by the likes of the Henry Moore Institute in Leeds – but also the artist’s apparent interest in sustainability. In her sculptures, many of the materials are found or recycled, and the architecture is designed to be deconstructed and repurposed.
These works on paper also bear the artist’s most instructive titles: ‘You will find peace and play among palm trees (Freedom Park)’ (2018) is a command which takes the player back to Lagos. Indeed, this exhibition, in collaboration with Culturescapes 2023, focuses on the Saharan space as one where reconnecting and reimagining Africa is possible. A promising nod to Ogunbiyi’s next major exhibition - hopefully, on the continent - too.
Temitayo Ogunbiyi: You will follow the Rhein and compose play is on view at the Museum Tinguely in Basel until 14 January 2024.
Temitayo Ogunbiyi’s solo exhibition at Museum Tinguely in Switzerland draws out intercity connections, between Basel and Lagos. You will follow the Rhein and compose play is the first overview of the artist’s practice produced between 2016 to now; and though diverse in media, themes and motifs recur. Running through her multidisciplinary practice are curves and lines, the methods Ogunbiyi uses to articulate travel and trade routes between cities, and the global flows of people and goods.
Inside, it commences with ‘Healing Verb’ (2023), a collection of foodstuffs sourced from Basel’s supermarkets that cater to specific communities. From her own Nigerian background, she includes dried mangoes, papaya, and ginger, goods used to restore health - and here, perhaps, nourish those in the diaspora with a taste of home. In collaboration with a Lagossian friend and fellow migrant, as well as the local Papermühle, she also produces a recipe card for a Welcome Fondue, creating a wholly new food which connects Nigeria and Switzerland.
Food, and music, often feature as both subject and material; indeed, Ogunbiyi’s practice overlaps with that of Emeka Ogboh, another artist who has migrated from Lagos to Europe, and exhibited with Ogunbiyi at South London Gallery’s recent Lagos, Peckham, Repeat. Whilst best known for his audio work, he also collaborated with the south London brewery Orbit to create a new beer for Lagos, Peckham, Repeat, recreating individuals’ hybrid identities with African chilli peppers and English hops.
Ogunbiyi’s titular piece travels from the taste of migration to its sounds: woks provide the shape of the pedestals and seats of her ‘musical instrument’. The base is made of a series of baking pans, sculpted out of yellow Numidian marble, sourced from a Roman quarry between Tunisia and Algeria. The locale is also the source of the olive wood used for the gugelhupf, a material and instrument which recreates connections between southern Europe, the Mediterranean, and the northern African continent.
In Basel, Ogunbiyi found cooking utensils in second-hand stores and supermarkets, wooden utensils which double up as drumsticks. Here, they are used to activate the installation, with live performances by local percussion students (recorded for those absent, another mark of the artist’s commitment to sustainable, durable practice). The artist’s ‘reappropriations’ across media speak to migration, and how a city might perform cosmopolitanism.
‘You will follow the Rhein and compose play’ uses brass, steel, and bronze curved rods, more pathways between African and European cities. These materials are used in the artist’s interactive play structures, but with a straightforward connection to Lagos. Outside, in the nearby Solitude Park, sits Ogunbiyi’s sculpture of steel poles, borrowed from homemade gyms in Nigeria.
Curves come too; wrapped manila rope speaks to her interest in plant structures, and ‘complex’ threaded Nigerian hairstyles, like ogun pari. The style, meaning the war is over, in the Yoruba language became popular after the Biafran or Nigerian Civil War (-1968), a more particular means of reconnecting after ethnic conflict.
Ogunbiyi also takes care, and pleasure, in the everyday, decorating the rubber mats necessary for children’s safety with one of her signature motifs. It is intended to draw attention to regulations and coded behaviours around play, and perhaps too, around museum spaces - but it’s also simply beautiful to behold.
Though large-scale and sculptural, the exhibition is carried by its smallness. Works on paper capture their interdisciplinary interests. Using lines that mimic strands of human hair, Ogunbiyi draws edible plants observed in Basel’s museums, their botanical details reproduced on herbarium paper. Not only does this reinforce the importance of drawing to the practice of sculpture – a continual effort undertaken by the likes of the Henry Moore Institute in Leeds – but also the artist’s apparent interest in sustainability. In her sculptures, many of the materials are found or recycled, and the architecture is designed to be deconstructed and repurposed.
These works on paper also bear the artist’s most instructive titles: ‘You will find peace and play among palm trees (Freedom Park)’ (2018) is a command which takes the player back to Lagos. Indeed, this exhibition, in collaboration with Culturescapes 2023, focuses on the Saharan space as one where reconnecting and reimagining Africa is possible. A promising nod to Ogunbiyi’s next major exhibition - hopefully, on the continent - too.
Temitayo Ogunbiyi: You will follow the Rhein and compose play is on view at the Museum Tinguely in Basel until 14 January 2024.
