A love for geometry and exploded compositions fuel Yomi’s figurative paintings

Abayomi Orimoloye, also known as Yomi, is a Nigerian-born artist who is currently based in Ottawa, Ontario. Unlike other artists of his his caliber, Yomi didn’t study art at university but electrical engineering, and while the two subjects are arguably worlds apart, it seems his degree may have had some influence on the geometry, maths and design evident within his paintings. Interested in the interiority of memory, relationships and the physical spaces we inhabit, Yomi’s fragmented figurative paintings always have a human presence in the center. Telling stories through a non-narrative approach, Yomi relies on metaphor, composition and colour to draw out not just meaning but also heritage. “I make works that explore themes of identity through a lens of humour,” says Yomi. “I often turn toward introspection and address both personal questions and broader societal concerns, all examined within the context of everyday life.”

The whimsicality of animated movies and the instrumentation of Yomi’s eclectic music taste are integral to his process, but geometry and maths play a leading role. “I’m not very good at math,” confesses Yomi. “I find it fascinating that the building blocks of both the natural and man-made world can be traced to mathematical equations and geometry.” In other words, the inside the structure of a building and the curvature of a leaf directly relate to the proportions of the human figure, especially the decimated compositions of Yomi’s striking portraits. “That makes math and geometry feel sacred in a way, like they’re the language of the gods,” adds Yomi. It should be no surprise that Picasso and dance-related artists such as FKA Twigs are an influence, which show up in his patchwork faces and graceful movements. But it’s “tension and contradiction, stillness and movement, a mood that’s hard to name” that permeatea throughout this unconventional body of work.