“In a decaying society, art, if it is truthful, must also reflect decay. And unless it wants to break faith with its social function, art must show the world as changeable. And help to change it”
Ernst Fischer. The Necessity of Art: A Marxist Approach.
Sophia-Yemisi Adeyemo (b. Burlingame, CA) is an interdisciplinary artist at the intersection of assemblage, painting, and sculpture. She draws from the visual impulses of folk objects, graffiti, protest art, shanty structures, non-canonized Afro-diasporic practices, and the lineage of painting Her work has a combination of painted elements and found objects. Seeking to investigate and counter our conditions under capitalism, the painted imagery recalls both historical and current instances of resistance, and grapples with the way that we receive, process, and engage with our reality through media. The objects --which take on the cloak of the paintings --are collected from dumpsters, alleyways, trash cans and the roadside. Often industrial scraps, domestic waste, or broken appliances, their use-value has been disrupted by an inability to perform their expected function. She believes these objects exist as fragments of experience, storytellers, and even beings in-and-of themselves. They are her collaborators.
Sophia-Yemisi Adeyemo is currently a Visual Arts MFA candidate at Mason Gross School of the Arts at Rutgers University. Her work has been exhibited at c1760 Gallery, Marianne Boesky Gallery, Picture Theory Gallery, BRIC Arts Media, The Manetti Shrem Museum of Art, and the Muskegon Museum of Art and has been featured in publications such as Hyperallergic, Art Cube, and “Ghetto Gastro Presents Black Power Kitchen”. She has been an Artist-in-Residence at BRIC Arts Media, Lazuli Residency, and the New York Academy of Art. She received her BFA in Painting from the Rhode Island School of Design.
