HIGHER SELF, MARCH 2021

Higher Self presents the first solo exhibition of Adulphina Imuede, a painter based in Lagos, Nigeria. This 20-piece presentation is grounded in understanding the deepest parts of her roots, while in pursuit of a higher sense of purpose. Her works are reflective encounters with spiritual, personal, and historical aspects of her own identity. Her paintings dance between the playfulness of caricature illustration and restraint of fine art painting. Imuede reimagines her own image in avatar-like portraits rendered in watercolor, ink, graphite pencil and acrylic, igniting visual discourses between elevated versions of herself and the viewer.

The three works after which the show is titled, Higher Self I, II and III, respectively mirror Imuede’s determined journey to attune her artistic voice, amidst growing challenges of social unrest and the Covid-19 global lockdown. In its entirety, the exhibition is a constellation of large works on canvas and smaller works on paper which speak to her personal healing, spirituality, and heightened intuition. Her work further explores classical mythologies to unveil hidden African historical roots, and uplift African identity. Higher Self paintings utilize deceivingly simple portraits to draw viewers into Imuede’s utopic astral dreams of radical self acceptance.