Kayode Ojo - Hellraiser (Private Club Wolfson)

Kayode Ojo
Hellraiser (Private Club Wolfson), 2023
Inkjet print on paper in artist frame
8 x 10 inches (20.3 x 25.4 cm)
Edition of 10, 2 AP


Composed of ready-made items of leisure, luxury, and revelry, Kayode Ojo’s (b. 1990) sleek sculptures move between the related visual languages of delicate minimalism and glittering opulence, foregrounding the transformative power of the material object and its ability to transport its owner through dimensions of time, place, and social status. 

In addition to incorporating cameras and photographic ephemera into his three-dimensional works, Ojo has also worked extensively in the medium of photography throughout his career. Created on the occasion of his solo exhibition at 52 Walker in 2023, Kayode Ojo: EDEN, Ojo depicts a bejeweled hand and chest of an anonymous partygoer; the present photograph conveys a kind of intuitive intimacy that is self-aware yet unguarded. Shot on film using a point-and-shoot Yashica T4, Ojo’s revelrous nightlife portraits of friends and fellow artists combine an unabashed visual honesty reminiscent of Nan Goldin and Larry Clark with a distinctly contemporary quality born from today’s mediated world—one that privileges seeing and being seen.