In this body of work, Fadekemi Ogunsanya portrays women, all of whom embody parts of herself and the women in her life. Influenced by the support that Ogunsanya receives from ‘relationships with women: friends, sisters and aunties,’ the paintings in Easy Remedies for a Tired Heart, rendered primarily in shades of restorative blue, are soothing to view.

Ogunsanya’s women are characterised according to the medium in which they are portrayed: ‘they’re different worlds’, she says about the different media. The hairstyles and jewellery of the figures correspond to the world to which they belong: shuku on paper, a low bun on canvas, for example. ‘The paper world is the freest’ says Ogunsanya, ‘I would probably call this my deepest emotional landscape.’ Inspired by the whimsical quality of illuminated manuscripts, Ogunsanya’s small scale works on paper are rooted in storytelling, referring to ancient Greek mythology or biblical stories as analogies for circumstances faced in her personal life.

Larger scale paintings show close-up scenes of tender, fleeting moments, akin to snapshots in a family album. Rendered in oil and acrylic paint with intricately patterned wooden frames, these paintings are accompanied by text which she calls ‘everyday poetry’, lifted from buses, films or Ogunsanya’s own journal to match the warm, loving gestures of the figures. These are portraits inspired by specific people, though not created in their likeness. Their resemblance, with similar hair, clothing, accessories and facial features, emphasises their bond.

In a new series of mixed media works, Ogunsanya overlays plastic mats with drawings of girls on brown scrapbook paper. Inspired by posters of braided hairstyles from Lagos markets, these works are a departure from her signature monochromatic blue palette. They are a manifestation of the artist ‘allowing [herself] to do something different, to be free and experiment.’ Flowers drawn in oil stick, which resembles crayon, and pasted over the drawings lend a deliberately kitschy softness to these works, alluding to nostalgic aesthetics of girlhood. The plastic mat is also imbued with nostalgia. Used prolifically in Nigerian households and spread across the floor of mosques in Lagos, the mat recognised by ‘everyone Nigerian’ is repurposed in Ogunsanya’s work, drawing attention to the intricate patterns that are often overlooked when the object is used in an everyday context.

In Easy Remedies for a Tired Heart, Ogunsanya presents both the strength and vulnerability of the women who are her subjects through the depiction of warm gestures and courageous actions, poetic phrases inspired by the everyday and experimental assemblages that recall childhood. A culmination of two years of ‘self-exploration and inner reckoning’ for the artist, the viewer is invited to reckon with their own self and find ease in the action.

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By Alayo Akinkugbe