From a Nigerian-American Artist, a Modernist Mashup of Two Nations

When you haven’t returned to your country of birth for a long time, there’s a lot to piece together about how it was then and how it is now. That’s what Nigerian-American artist and designer Olalekan Jeyifous is trying to do in his new solo exhibition at the 50Golborne gallery in London.

Jeyifous left Nigeria for America when he was six, and he’s lived in New York City ever since. But Nigerian cities continue to play a central role in his work. Through his new art project, he “considers what it means to be a part of the diaspora and to reflect on a country that I have not been back to in over 30 years, but still consider home,” he tells CityLab. For the project, Jeyifous, who has a background in architecture, has designed and constructed architectural follies—buildings meant solely for decoration that seem like they serve a purpose. His follies are drawn from his now-distant memories and family photographs, as well as the photos in Nigerian news. The resulting structures are modernist mashups of urban staples in Nigeria and America. “The images combine recognizable icons of the informal economies of Lagos, Ibadan, Ile-Ife, and Brooklyn,” he says, “from street vendors, industrial waste, and power generators to luxury real-estate, mobile technology, and varying modes of public transportation.”

Jeyifous’s follies are available as hand-cut card stock collages, wooden models and a tapestry at the exhibition, which runs from September 9 to 30. He’s also installing a real one in Queens Park, New York at the end of the month. Check out some images of his work below: