Dear Jadé Fadojutimi...
Estimated reading time: 4 minutes, 7 seconds. Contains 826 words
Dear Jadé,
I always felt like it was difficult to defend my position of calling the colors themselves the true subjects of my paintings. Thank you for proving that it’s possible! Oh, and thank you for making abstractions that bring me to tears. It’s genuinely a much-needed emotional reset.
I was on a personal research mission online recently to find more abstract artists that I could admire and look towards for inspiration. I don’t necessarily have a favorite form of art-making, but I do have a bias towards painting, specifically expressive, vivid, and non-representational bodies of work. So, finding Jadé Fadojutimi wasn’t an accident, but definitely a successful discovery.
Jadé (pronounced Jah-dey) Fadojutimi is a UK-based painter who has the profound skill of blending abstraction with hints of representation and maximized, saturated color. The first time I saw her work, I almost fell to tears. Dramatic reaction, I know. You don’t have to tell me twice! But as an abstract artist myself, the way she had the colors speaking to one another moved me in a way that’s tricky to write in a blog post. Everything was just dancing with one another in the most perfect chaos that it was hard to keep a straight face. Similar to my experience exploring the work of Tiffany Tang, my reaction made even more sense when I read her work description, via Pippy Houldsworth Gallery:
Jadé Fadojutimi's paintings offer an insight into the artist's quest for identity and self-knowledge. For Fadojutimi, painting is like looking into a windowpane and seeing the reflection of her self, the context in which she lives, and the distorted fusion of these two. Using the canvas as a sounding board, she grapples with memories of everyday experiences, both good and bad. Through this process Fadojutimi examines how her sense of self is constructed so that her paintings communicate forms of emotion which are impossible to convey through language. - houldsworth.co.uk
An obvious standout in Fadojutimi’s work is the color. She is not afraid to make clear that both the color and the paint mediums themselves are a prominent subject matter of her work. It’s easy for an art viewer to default on looking for representations of things or familiar shapes in abstract works, even if creating something recognizable is not the primary intention of the artist. For Fadojutimi’s work, a viewer has no choice but to witness the color as the star of the show in each composition. At the same time, however, is the exploration of adornment and identity that weaves itself into the mark-making. Semi-familiar objects, such as items of clothing or body parts, can be recognized if one really stops to take in all aspects of the painting. Her love of color and her curiosity for exploring identity marries each other seamlessly on the surface.
What I find particularly delightful about these works as a whole is the effect of ‘masterpieces within masterpieces.’ You can look at any isolated section of her paintings and find an incredible composition on its own. The way that the greens jump off the page while talking with the peaches and reds next to them, like I have said, moves me and makes me giddy in a way that essentially only art could explain. In my own personal views, I think it’s easy to get caught up in the idea that a work of art needs to have a specific meaning as opposed to standing on its own. Jennifer Higgie describes the sensation beautifully:
In these paintings, the world, in all of its chaotic glory, exists as an imitation. Art is not an explanation; it’s a shot of energy, a flash of colour; a shimmer, a reaction a line thrown out to see who might pick it up. - Jennifer Higgie, Thoughts on the paintings of Jadé Fadojutimi (1)
Fadojutimi took full advantage of her time in lockdown during the Covid pandemic, using it as an opportunity to play with color and embrace boundless imagination while coping with the chaos of the outside world (2). The result was a body of work known as Jesture, a collection of 2020 paintings utilizing acrylics, oils, and oil pastels that in both subject and title “encompasses a lot of the absurdity we have all been experiencing”. (3) I cannot thank her enough for creating the most perfect body of work to both represent the energy of this time period and to uplift her viewers in ways thats joyous and relatable.
On top of that, I can also relate to her best creative energy coming to her after 11PM at night.
-Sasha
FOLLOW AND SUPPORT JADÉ FADOJUTIMI
(note: all artwork images can be viewed at full resolution on both the artist website and the UK gallery site)
- Jadé Fadojumity, Jesture, 2020 produced by Pippy Houldsworth Gallery, London, following the exhibition.
- BBC Arts (@bbcarts) on twitter.
- https://www.vogue.co.uk/arts-and-lifestyle/article/jade-fadojutimi-interview