
BIOGRAPHY
Adept with the palette knife, Samuel intricately renders 3-dimensional skin textures, drawing inspiration from the techniques of revered artists such as Vincent Van Gogh, Barkley Hendricks, Alex Katz, and Arja Valimaki. His creative narratives delve into themes of ‘scaring’ prevalent in Yoruba culture, toxic masculinity, macho male culture, and the constructs of gender roles and equality. Samuel’s upbringing amidst five sisters in a patriarchal society significantly influences his art. He employs a palette favoring traditionally “female” hues like rose and pastel pinks, juxtaposing them with seemingly “brute” masculine subjects such as his Cowboy character.
His artistic passion centers on exploring texture through the mediums of oils, acrylics, charcoal, and pastels. Samuel’s canvases, often grand in scale, feature predominantly male, non-gender normative portraits characterized by vibrant and dramatic expressions.
“I cross the boundaries of traditional masculinity, macho culture, societal gender assertions and associations. The pink clothing and background serve as an emblem of softness, kindness, nurturance, and compassion; qualities that are often thought of as feminine. The dark palette-painted skin pays homage to the body scarification culture of the Ife, a Yoruba tribe of Nigeria. The pink colour scheme accentuates the figures and imagines the notion of men in pink from a fresh perspective. I envision my portraits as an effort to change representations of masculinity, and shift ideas on what it means to be a man.”
Samuel Olayombo (born in 1991) is a Nigerian artist, studied fine and applied arts at the University of Benin and is currently based in Accra, Ghana. His work is shown internationally and was part of a group exhibition at Los Angeles’ UTA Artists Space in 2023. Olayombo artworks are part of collections including Hornik, Los Angeles ; The Dean Collection, Los Angeles, CA; Olym Collection, Brussels; Sir David Adjaye Collection, New York City, NY; Elliot Perry Art Collection, Tennessee ; Art Maisonmarios, Germany ; Se Tinat Collection, Madrid; The Bentata Collection, Miami, FL, among others. He was a 2021 Visiting Fellow at the Noldor Artist Residency and presented his first institutional solo exhibition curated by Fabiola Ondzounga at the Institute Museum of Ghana, Accra, in March 2023. After a solo show at Zidoun-Bossuyt Dubai in September 2023, Samuel Olayombo presented a solo exhibition at Zidoun-Bossuyt Paris in September 2024.