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| ruby oniyinyechi amanze (b. 1982) in front of Kisses at a Beach with a Hammock for Audre, photographed by Emily Johnston, 2015, Deutsche Wealth. |
Drawing is often considered the classical foundation of all artistic practices. An academia structure cannot be considered a truly authentic without it. Yet also, most importantly, drawing is the fundamental element in art. Some use drawing as the basis, as a start to something, a preliminary, a sketch. However, artists out in the world—Black women artists— are primarily drawers and they’re changing the gallery walls one piece of paper at a time. One particular favorite is ruby oniyinyechi amanze.
In
Mask Magazine, amanze says, “we draw because we are human. We are compelled to mark our existence.”
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| Kindred, graphite, ink, pigment, enamel, photo transfers, glitter on paper, 80” x 78,” 2014, courtesy of the artist to Mask Magazine. |
ruby oniyinyechi amanze was born in Nigeria. She was raised in the United Kingdom before moving to the United States. She received a summa cum laude Bachelor of Fine Arts degree from Temple University's Tyler School for the Arts in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania and a Master of Fine Arts from Cranbrook Academy of Art in Bloomfield Hills, Michigan.
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| either way, you’ll be in a pool of something, graphite, ink, and photo transfers on paper, 101.6 cm x 152.4 cm, Goodman Gallery. |
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| audre & i [Ghanaian beaches], ink, graphite, photo transfers, and colored pencils, 34 1/4” x 52,” 2019, artsy. |
amanze’s drawings are called “post colonial hybrids.” She blends the hand drawn with the collage image, weaving two molds into one cohesive composition. Her figures are jarring half human, half wild jungle creature manifestations, going beyond taking on the negative perceptions of African people with an “if savage is how you see us, then let the claws and teeth come out biting your ignorance.” The nonlinear bodies (sometimes headless like a floating Yinka Shinobare sculpture) exist largely in a provocative emptiness, an open ended space allowing viewers to draw their own response. The laboriously detailed pencil and ink work are highly impressive— the careful rendered hair, expressive faces emoting pensiveness and deeply internal reflection, delicate big cat fur, and patterned textile fabrics collaged alongside fascinating geometry. These peculiar narratives combine ancestral family trees, architecture, science, and afrofuturism operating between presence and transcendence.
amanze has received several honors including a Fulbright fellowship to her native Nigeria, an Open Sessions at the Drawing Center in New York City, New York, artist-in-residence at Cooper Union, and the Fountainhead Residency in Miami, Florida. She has shown in Nigeria, the United States, France, the UK, South Africa, and Portugal and is in the permanent collections of Studio Museum Harlem, the Deutsche Bank, The Jewish Museum, and The Microsoft Collection.
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| Without a Care in the Galaxy, we Danced on Galaxies (or Red Sand with a Different Kind of Sky) with Ghosts of your Fatherland Keeping Watch, Deutsche Bank Collection, 2015, Lux-Mag. |
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| Without a Care in the Galaxy, we Danced on Galaxies (or Red Sand with a Different Kind of Sky) with Ghosts of your Fatherland Keeping Watch, |
Currently, ruby oniyinyechi amanze lives in Brooklyn, New York, teaches drawing at Pratt Institute, and making new work.
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