Evaluator Abi Ola (artist)

Abi Ola’s artworks look at old family photographs and the patterns she finds on their clothing. She does not paint the faces to bring more attention to the beautiful shapes and colours of the figure’s clothes. This is also to represent that the artist does not personally know these family members because they passed away before she was born, or they live in another country. She wants the viewer to connect to the idea of knowing about distant family members and friends but never meeting them in real life, and for the viewer to place themselves in her faceless portraits.
The symbols and motifs also come from gallery and museum trips, her imagination and old clothes she finds around her house. She wants to overwhelm the viewer with patterns to bring the audience into her world. The process of drawing and painting patterns repeatedly is also therapeutic for the artist.
Abi is in her second year doing a Master of Fine Arts at the Slade School of Fine Art. Prior to this she graduated from Goldsmiths, University of London in 2019. Recent exhibitions included, her solo show at the Building Centre London, New Wave “Love At A Distance” as part of the Bloomsbury Festival Art Prize 2020, duo show “The Gaze Is A Singular Act” at the Kupfer Gallery London 2020, and a group show at the ASC Gallery London, “The Slade Runner” 2020.

29th August – 19th September 2020 – The Gaze Is A Singular Act – Kupfer, London E9 6JU – Patterns In My Bedroom photography series, installation, and Two Sisters painting.

7th – 13th February 2020 – Fine Art – The Old Biscuit Factory, London SE16 4DG – “Red Seat, Green Seat, Blue Chair” A4 mixed media sculptural paints.

10th January – 31st January 2020 – Slade Runner – ASC Gallery, The Chaplin Centre, London, SE17 2DG - “Patterns” A0 Screen print.

16th October 2020 – 22nd January 2021 – Vision – Bloomsbury Festival Art Prize – The Building Centre – Store Street London

9th December 2020 – Artist Talk – University of the Arts London – The Curation Society - Microsoft Teams