When the fire dies
When the fire dies
it covers its face with ashes….
Only Olodumare knows the number of strands that got plucked from my beard last weekend.
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When the fire dies
it covers its face with ashes….
Only Olodumare knows the number of strands that got plucked from my beard last weekend.
I turn the same painting upside down, as Iya Afilaka instructed me. And it still remains legible.
Why?
Because we have paid Iba (homage)
to the vagina that is turned
upside down, yet
does not drip
This is the latest Portrait of Moyo Okediji by a young Nigerian artist, Femi Okediji. I really enjoy his mastery of chiaroscuro. The loose strokes of his composition merge structurally into a coherent musical gradient that gives form to my facial expression.
When nobody supports you,
when everybody says no to you,
when people turn down your requests,
and you cannot get any grant
when they band together to oppose you,
and say your ideas are not practical
and they frown when they see you:
don’t despair;
these are signs that you are moving in the right direction;
keep placing one foot ahead of the other
continue to push ahead
There is an ancient Yoruba poem about Àró, the alien.
Listen, the translation is below the Yoruba original.
Mo gbinlá mi sóko
Mo gbinkàn mi sóko
Ewúrẹ́ Àró fi jẹ;
Àgùtàn Àró fi jẹ
Èmi ò mọ ohun Àró ní mo ṣe.
I planted okra on my farmland
The painting of this canvas started in 2019 and ended in 2020.
Look to your weakness, because therein lies your strength.
Where you are strongest is where you are weakness.
Focus not on your achievements
Closely embrace your failures.