Woody De Othello

Working primarily in ceramic, wood and bronze, he creates assemblages of everyday artefacts — phones, television remotes, clocks, lamps, calendars, pipes, shoes, and light switches — that he stacks on glazed ceramic stools, chairs, radiators, and step ladders. “The objects mimic actions that humans perform,” says Othello. “They’re extensions of our own actions. We use phones to speak and to listen, clocks to tell time, vessels to hold things, and our bodies are indicators of all of those.”

A playful sense of humour infuses Othello’s work and manifests in visual puns and cartoonish figuration. His vessels sometimes sprout ears and lips. They perch precariously on spindly legs. Elongated arms wrap protectively around their bodies, lending them an absurdist pathos that nudges them towards the uncanny. Standing alone or staged on theatrical plinths, his sculptures become actors in a drama of his own making. “I started to think about what would happen if the objects in the space of the figure were affected with the same type of spirit and energy as a figure. It’s become another way for me to have a conversation around psychological and emotional states.”

Othello looks to myriad sources, from jazz music and French Surrealism to California Funk Art of the late 50’s – 70’s and the radical, experimental practices of Ron Nagle and Mike Henderson. Informed by his own Haitian ancestry, he draws on the nkisi figures of Central Africa, the supernatural objects of Vodou folklore and the animistic face jugs made by enslaved Black potters from Edgefield, South Carolina in the 1860s. 

All images courtesy the artist, Jessica Silverman, Karma and Stephen Friedman Gallery.