Friday Focus: Sikelela Owen
Sikelela Owen (B.1984, UK) is an artist living and working in London. Her first solo show with Taymour Grahne Projects 'Steady Love' took place in November 2021. Her works are part of the MACAAL (Marrakesh) and X Museum (Beijing) collections and she is actively becoming a part of the zeitgeist and the important renaissance in the painting of Black figures. In Owen's paintings, that focus on moments of love and connectivity, figures are made up of curved limbs, shoulders that heed, and outstretched arms that knowingly contour to the shape of a cohort. These bodies are never quite separate, rarely angular; they are people, personalities, and faces that seldom exist without the physical presence or memory of another. Owen takes these figures from family photographs and stills, merging them with art historical references from the past
and present.
Can you tell me about your practice? How do you get started on a piece of work?
I make loose figurative paintings, drawings and mono prints using oil paints. Usually layered and mixed with medium. I usually start from personal imagery and an ongoing conversation with painting history, the work sort of develops around personal narrative often affected by external events.
Who or what are your biggest influences?
I have a number of influences living and dead, I usually gravitate to work which is honest, intimate, emotional and yet leaves plenty of room for the viewer. To name a few: Manet; Joaquin Sorrolo; Velasquez; Carravagio; Carrie May Weems; Claudette Johnson; Alex Katz; Barkley L.Hendricks and Chantal Joffe.
No Woman, No Cry (1998) by Chris Ofili, was the first contemporary painting I got to see in real life, that really made me think it was possible to create something similar now. Its relationship with historical painting, its centring of Doreen Lawrence as an individual and as an avatar for grief, fear, loss, dignity in the face of injustice and strength really touched me, and fuelled my desire to make something that was that honest and vulnerable. It’s an ongoing ambition which is also led by the music of my formative years, such asTracey chapman and her storytelling.
Also my dad’s best friend studied at Central Saint Martin and we’d visit contemporary exhibitions there alongside visiting the National gallery, so it allowed me soak in a lot of work and never question my presence in these spaces.
It feels that Intimacy is ever present in your work, whether your portraiture captures a solitary figure or a moment in time amongst others, would you agree?
Yes my work has explored a number of areas but in particular my current series has explored the intimacy of family, motherhood, fatherhood and unarmed moments against the backdrop of our current world environment.
I love oil paints participatory nature, its slowness, its fluidity , it’s opacity and its transparency and it’s ability to surprise me after all these years, it’s like a collaborator.
Yet in the same way with wall drawings of old inherited memories via snapshots of relatives, unknown wall drawings with charcoal make the most sense.
Pastels offer an opportunity to leave the tools behind while monoprint enables me to get ideas and changes down before they escape.
I also love a number of other materials which may not be the centre of the work but are really important for example collage, ink and drawings. It’s something that I often think about as a viewer especially when I travel and see work in situ such as the layering in St Luigi dei Francesi around a Caravaggio painting.
Ohhh I don’t know my brush I suppose I have too many but they’re all necessary.
An artistic revelation during my BA degree was:
Rasheed Araeen 'The Other Story: Afro-Asian Artists in Post-War Britain' Hayward Gallery, Southbank Centre, London, 1989. it introduced me to a lot of artists I hadn’t seen anywhere else when I entered university.
An academic revelation during my MA degree was: The Absolute Bourgeois: Artists and Politics in France, 1848-1851 by T. J. Clark . An amazing book that whilst academic in nature, speaks so fluidly about these paintings in their time. How these paintings which we now think of as being safe and aesthetic masterpieces were something quite different in their time, centring new figures and pushing them to the forefront, often to the distaste of the arts society during this period. It’s one of a three part series.
Both these books came along at really good times for me and really expanded my thinking and my work and my understanding of the history my work was part of, giving me confidence to make work which felt honest and interested me, regardless of whether it made sense in the larger art world at the time. If Manet could survive some of his truly horrific reviews I could keep on painting in private.
Finally, is there anything new coming up that you would like to tell us about?
I just recently took part in the1:54 Contemporary African Art Fair’s 10th London edition, with Taymour Grahne Gallery alongside NYC-based artist Nadia Ayari and London based artists Cara Nahaul, Nada Elkalaawy where my work was well received. I am also part of a landscape show curated by Taymour Grahne opening on the 15th November at 67 Great Titchfield Street London alongside 24 other international artists.
I’ve also just welcomed my second child in October 2022 so I will be taking a break!
Images Courtesy of Sikelela Owen and Taymour Grahne Projects.
1. Aaliyah and Fifi (on the couch), 2021
Oil on canvas
46 x 36 cm. / 18 x 14 in.
2. Ethels Garden, 2021
Oil on canvas
120 x 120 cm. / 47 x 47 in.
3. The Hug (Steady Love), 2021
Oil on canvas
150 x 180 cm. / 59 x 71 in.
4. Laying with Eli, 2021
Oil on canvas
70 x 50 cm. / 27 x 20 in.
5. Eli and Daddy, 2021
Oil on canvas
36 x 46 cm. / 14 x 18 in.
6. The Hunt (Moyo’s of New Jersey), 2022
Oil on canvas
155 x 160 cm. / 61 x 62.9 in.
7. David (Pillow), 2022
Oil on canvas
63 x 71 cm. / 160 x 180 cm.