Lecture Questions/Response: Nnenna Okore

1. Are you interested in renewing the objects you use in your work? Or is your aim to keep the objects in the state they were found?

2. Does the history behind a task/process influence your work at all?

Response:

3 words: diversity, identity, life

Nnenna talked a lot about life and the life of the objects she uses in her work. She explained that in Nigeria, where she grew up, it was useful for people to find ways to reuse paper and other objects for different things. She phrased it as "reusable life". She also expressed interest in the life beyond objects. Specifically she mentioned paper. In some of her work she creates structures that have to do with architecture, the past, etc.

She feels that because of her background, it influences her work, she said some of her work is a response to her struggle with culture shock in America. She also works with history in her work. Specifically, in her piece "Abandoned History" she took discarded library catalog cards and reused them in this piece, giving them new life. She talked about what the history meant to her specifically how, in Nigeria, they used card catalogs even now, and when she came here, we have moved to online catalogs and it really threw her for a loop. After hearing her thoughts on this piece, it really became something more to me, and I have a better understanding of it.

In some of her newer work she has focused on the human figure and biomorphic forms. I really enjoyed her work "Lamps II" and its forms that mimic the human figure. It also had a really neat light element to it, which I always love seeing in work. In her work "Emissaries" she strived to embody mortality, life, and aging through using discarded items and reassembling them into these forms. She said that she lets the natural processes get at her work, she let's the materials take their course. And in this she says she is glorifying aging and making it important, that we should embrace it.

I believe I know the answers to my questions. She prefers to let the items take their natural course, and she really doesn't do anything to prevent that from happening. If she sells a piece, she leaves it to the buyer to preserve it how they wish, she takes no responsibility for what happens to the piece after it leaves her hands.

She uses a lot of traditional methods in her work, and she seems to pay attention to the process, the craft, and she doesn't stay wrapped up in the outcome.