The Museum of Modern Art (MoMA) presents Odili Donald Odita: Songs from Life, a new site-specific commission in the Museum’s main lobby, which opened on the 8th of April and will be on view through 2025. For this project, Odita and his team worked from February to April to envelop the entire lobby in bright planes of interweaving colors. Visitors have the opportunity to see the artist at work during public hours, and can scan a QR code to listen to an accompanying playlist of songs Odita used as primary sources of inspiration for the commission.
Odili Donald Odita: Songs from Life is organised by Ugochukwu-Smooth Nzewi, The Steve and Lisa Tananbaum Curator, Department of Painting and Sculpture, with Elizabeth Wickham, Curatorial Assistant, Department of Painting and Sculpture. “Odita’s work reflects the history of abstract painting, African and African American textile traditions, and the indigenous mural art of his Nigerian heritage,” said Nzewi. The artist draws reference from music and art history, with which he transforms MoMA’s main lobby into a grand opera of brilliant colors and geometric patterns that enrich Museum visitors’ experience. This commission is Odita’s largest to date.
The artist had this to say, “Through abstraction, I aim to reflect the complexities of the human experience, creating patterns and rhythms that resonate on both visual and emotional levels to get the viewer to reflect upon their own circumstances with respect to the artwork’s engagement through theme and construction.” Executed with acrylic latex paint used specifically on interior walls, the floor-to-ceiling installation covers the Museum’s lobby in a cascading kaleidoscope of colors that, for the artist, are expressions of freedom and change. Music—the primary source of inspiration for this commission—is also crucial to Odita’s practice, as it allows him to think through problems in his paintings and connect with the passion and community it creates among people. Each section of Songs from Life is anchored by a selection of songs by far-ranging musical influences, including Led Zeppelin, Michael Jackson, Marvin Gaye, Talking Heads, Bill Withers, Fela Anikulapo Kuti, and many more, all of which the viewers can listen to by scanning a QR code.
About the artist:
Odili Donald Odita (b. 1966, Enugu, Nigeria) is an abstract painter who currently lives and works in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. Odita received his BFA with distinction from Ohio State University, and his MFA from Bennington College. In 1998, he earned an ART/OMI International Art Residency. Since 2006, Odita has been a professor of painting at the Tyler School of Art at Temple University in Philadelphia. Odita’s recent solo exhibitions and public commissions include Abroms-Engel Institute for the Visual Arts, Alabama (2024), The Contemporary Dayton, Ohio (2022), Stanley Museum of Art, Iowa (2022) and Boca Raton Museum of Art, Florida (2021), among others. Leadership support for the commission is provided by the Steven A. and Lisa Tananbaum Endowment for Contemporary Art Commissions.
