Maureen Paley presents ‘The Eyes of the Beloved are Everywhere,’ Chioma Ebinama’s second solo exhibition with the gallery and her first at Morena di Luna, Hove.
Chioma Ebinama, a Nigerian-American artist, draws from a wide range of visual and cultural inspirations, using myth and cosmology to examine her inner being. Her work centers around watercolours on paper, a medium that elucidates mark-making as both a meditative act and a tool for self-liberation.
“I have envisioned a story of a feminine figure recalling her past life as a mermaid (or a sea nymph) and thus longs to return to the sea. Turning to the sea can also be a metaphor of letting go of self-imposed social constructs. I’ve been reading a lot about neurodivergence in women and how it often goes undiagnosed because of “masking”, in which a neurodivergent person learns to suppress or camouflage their authentic selves often by mirroring the behaviour of neurotypical people. That said, I think everyone “masks” a little bit especially those coming from the margins who must exist in heteronormative spaces. The protagonist has decided to “unmask” and the hybridity (half-fish, half-woman) is an interesting (perhaps ancient) means of describing ways of being that do not fit into simple categories.”
— Chioma Ebinama.
Image courtesy of Maureen Paley/Stephen James
Ebinama questions the standards of heteronormative and neurotypical decorum. She describes her subject as “letting go of human constructs, allowing herself a less-defined freedom of being” as she returns to the sea.
Her works have been selected for solo exhibitions like The Eleventh House, The Breeder, Athens, Greece (2023); tipota, Fortnight Institute, New York, USA (2022); A Spiral Shell, Maureen Paley, London (2021); mud & butterflies, Galeria Catinca Tabacaru, Bucharest, Romania (2021); Lay All Your Love On Me, Salon 94, New York, USA (2021); Leave the thorns and take the rose, The Breeder Gallery, Athens, Greece (2020) and Now I only believe in…Love, Fortnight Institute, New York, USA (2020).
Ebinama’s works can be found in the Whitney Museum Collection, Perez Museum Collection, and LACMA Collection. She was recently awarded the Ezra Jack Keat Honor Award for her illustrations for Emile and the Field. She has participated in the Hayward Gallery Touring exhibition Hollow Earth: Art, Caves & The Subterranean Imaginary at Nottingham Contemporary (2022/2023), touring to The Lewis Glucksman Gallery, Cork (2023); and the Royal Albert Memorial Museum, Exeter (2023/2024).
The solo exhibition ‘The Eyes of the Beloved are Everywhere,’ will open on the 1st of July, 2023. It will be on view till the 10th of September, 2023.
