Precious Okoyomon
Talk Art
Russell Tovey and Robert Diament c/o Independent Talent
4.6 • 1.1K Ratings
🗓️ 8 August 2024
⏱️ 62 minutes
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Summary
We meet Precious Okoyomon – poet, artist, and chef – stages sculptural topographies composed of living, growing, decaying, and dying materials, including rock, water, wildflowers, snails, and vines. For Okoyomon, nature is inseparable from the historical marks of colonisation and enslavement. In their work, plants like kudzu – a vine native to Asia that was first introduced by the US government to farms in Mississippi in 1876 as a means to fortify erosion of local soil, which had been degraded by the over-cultivation of cotton, and then turned to be uncontrollably invasive – become metaphors for the entanglement of slavery, racialisation, and diaspora with nature, nonetheless holding the capacity for change and revitalisation.
Through their work, Okoyomon explores the intricate interplay between nature, chaos, and regeneration. Raised in the expanses of Ohio’s Midwest, Okoyomon’s formative years were steeped in the natural world. ‘My first love is very much the Earth, the soil,’ they say in this new episode of ‘Meet the artists.’ The sentiment informs their multifaceted practice, encompassing installations, poetry, and culinary arts. Characterized by what they describe as an ‘organic flow,’ in their work each medium seamlessly intersects with the others to create ‘the endless poem.’
Their invasive garden installations frequently feature kudzu, a vine introduced to the American South post-slavery, which Okoyomon employs as a potent metaphor for colonization. The kudzu’s unrestrained growth overtakes a space, embodying themes of chaos and natural reclamation. ‘What dies, dies. What grows is sprung up inside of that. And the beauty of everything is that it regenerates,’ they explain, underscoring the cyclical nature of their practice.
Precious Okoyomon’s work can be seen at Fondation Beyeler’s ‘Summer Show’, May 19 – August 11, 2024. They have also co-conceptualized the show. Their work is also on view as part of the Nigerian Pavilion at the 60th Biennale di Venezia 2024.
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Transcript
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| 0:00.0 | This episode of Talk Art is brought to you by Chanel. |
| 0:04.0 | That's right and we are very excited that Chanel Connects podcast is back for its fourth season. |
| 0:10.0 | This round, Chanel Connects is taking you to the Venice Bianale to meet the artists, curators and |
| 0:15.7 | thinkers shaping culture today. |
| 0:18.3 | Now we particularly love listening to artist William Kentridge and curator Caroline |
| 0:22.4 | Christophikaggia discuss the Venice installation. artist William Kentridge and curator Carolyn Christo Pacagiev |
| 0:23.6 | discussed the Venice installation of William's film Self-Portrait as a coffee pot |
| 0:27.6 | Carolyn's work at the Castello de Rivly Museum in Italy and the origins of |
| 0:32.1 | their long relationship. |
| 0:33.8 | I also really enjoyed listening to two of the most remarkable women from the gallery scene, |
| 0:39.1 | the legendary Sadie Kohls, who has shaped the art world for decades, and Angelina Volk, who is set to do the same. |
| 0:46.3 | They discuss the Venice Bionale how it sets the international art agenda and how working |
| 0:51.7 | with artists is a great love affair. |
| 0:54.0 | Shinnell connects. |
| 0:56.0 | Listen now on your preferred streaming platforms or on Shinnell. com. Good afternoon, good morning, good evening, wherever you are in the world. |
| 1:09.0 | I'm Russell Tovey. |
| 1:10.0 | And I'm Robert Diamant. |
| 1:12.0 | And this is Talk Art welcome to talk art how are you today Rob today |
| 1:16.8 | Russell I am feeling like the freshest breath of air and that's actually verbatim. That's something that today's |
| 1:25.3 | guest said in the article that I first read back way way back in the pandemic. I |
| 1:31.6 | think it was like in the middle maybe when we were allowed to go outside again, but I during the first pandemic I discovered the New York Times app and as a person in the UK and Margate I don't really read the New York Times necessarily, but I discovered the app and because we were stuck inside all the time I sort of went into a wormhole about all the art articles in the New York Times app and one of those articles was about then new to the scene artist, but now is an artist who has exhibited in many, many museums, institutions, galleries, and is kind of really well known to all of us at least in our friendship group I think and we both recently were at foundation |
| 2:06.8 | Biola in Basel during art Basel and today's guest had an amazing artwork which they had created using poisonous plants and butterflies and it's really curious to me because today's guest is an artist who is described as a poet obviously an artist but also a chef and to me these kind of like sculptures that they create and also topographies kind of like little worlds |
... |
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