“I am a painter of predominately mid to large-scale paintings concerned with figuration. The works are full of depictions of everyday stories and ordinary moments, they champion and chronicle Black experience by exploring untold, often forgotten and even neglected narratives of people of the African diaspora through painting as speculative history writing, collaging the past and the present, individual and shared memories - acknowledging just how fragmented and circumstantial history is.
I use photographs as source material for my paintings and over the years I have built up a vast archive of primarily instamatic snapshots from the 1950s to the 1980s. During this period, photography became cheaper and more readily available to a broader population, which led to a more diverse representation of histories being documented through photography.”
Esiri Erheriene-Essi (b. 1982) is a UK-born and Amsterdam-based Nigerian artist from Lewisham, South London. After completing a foundation year at Camberwell College, she continued on to the University of East London where she received a BA in Media Studies (2004) and subsequently, a Masters of Fine Art (2006). In 2009, Erheriene-Essi received the Dutch Royal Award for Modern Painting prize.
Her solo shows include: Anthony Gallery, Chicago, IL, US (2023); MARUANI MERCIER, Brussels, Belgium (2023); Nino Mier Gallery, Los Angeles, CA, US (2022); Galerie Ron Mandos, Amsterdam, The Netherlands (2021); Museum Arnhem, Arnhem, The Netherlands (2014).
Group exhibitions include: When We See Us: A Century of Black Figuration in Painting, Kunstmuseum Basel, Basel, Switzerland (2024); Op Scherp (In Focus), Centraal Museum, Utrecht, The Netherlands (2024); Kindred Worlds: The Priscila and Alvin Hudgins Collection, Hudson River Museum, Yonkers, NY, US (2023); Africa Supernova: Contemporary African painting collection by Carla and Pieter Schulting, Kunsthal KAdE, Amersfoort, The Netherlands (2023); When We See Us: A Century of Black Figuration in Painting, Zeitz MOCAA, Cape Town, South Africa (2022); Greatest Source of My Longing, Galerie Barbara Thumm, Berlin, Germany (2022); From primal beast to smoking croissant, Stedelijk Museum Schiedam, Schiedam, The Netherlands (2022); Tomorrow is a Different Day - 1980 – Now, Stedelijk Museum Amsterdam, Amsterdam, The Netherlands (2021); ME: An Exhibition of Contemporary Self-Portraiture, High Line Nine, New York, NY, US (2020).
Erheriene-Essi’s work is included in the collections of Stedelijk Museum Amsterdam, Netherlands; Institute of Contemporary Art (ICA), Miami, US; Warwick Arts Centre, Coventry, UK; Mana Contemporary, Chicago, US; the Ministry of the Interior and Kingdom Relations of The Netherlands; Museum Arnhem, Netherlands; Princeton University Art Museum, Princeton, New Jersey, US; The Collection of Beth Rudin DeWoody, US; and Stedelijk Museum Schiedam, Netherlands among others.
