Junger Ankauf

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Emeka Ogboh - Oshodi Stock Exchange

2018

Emeka Ogboh was born in Enugu, Nigeria, in 1977. He lives and works in Berlin and in Lagos. In 2001 he completed his studies in the fine and applied arts at the University of Nigeria Nsukka. The main subject of his multimedia oeuvre is the exploration of cultural identity in relation to its globalized present.

Oshodi Stock Exchange 2014/16, Installation view Art Cologne 2018 © Emeka Ogboh

Oshodi Stock Exchange, 2014/2016, 6 channel audio

The sound piece Oshodi Stock Exchange is part of a site-specifically realized series and acoustically sets the beholder in the economic realities of Lagos, Nigeria. The artist has developed a soundtrack for the work that combines recordings of the voices of street ven-dors hawking their wares and soundscapes from Lagos layered with piano scores featuring the composer Kristian Kowatsch, The result is a soundscape that, if it perceived at all in the quick pace of everyday life, then as noise; encountered in an exhibition setting, however, it reveals the intensity and diversity of a megacity in all its virtually orchestral elements. With Oshodi Stock Exchange, the beholder is immersed in a social sound sculpture: an actual bus station (Oshodi) in Lagos where goods are also traded. This socioeconomic “melting pot” brings real people from diverse cultures together in one city. This is completely different from the anonymous, digitalized global stock exchange. The artist thus succeeds in creating an impressive, personal portrait of Lagos, an installation for each presentation of which he produces a cadmium yellow-colored painted setting. Ogboh hereby sharpens our sense of hearing as well as our visual perception and spurs our imagination.

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