A-ARTs: Fragile balance of aesthetic, theme in Okoro’s ‘Afrocentric identity’

'Echoes of Extinction' (print on paper, 45 x 68cm, dated 2025) by Godspower Okoro.

By Tajudeen Sowole

THE challenge of generating intellectually rich content in the creation of a masterpiece appears to have been shared with the appreciating end of the creative chain. Appreciation of some works of art demands certain energy of critical view, perhaps similar to the efforts of the artist in creating a piece, so explains one of the recent works of Godspower Okoro.

In the print on paper work, Echoes of Extinction, Okoro’s brushings attempt to capture environmental issue, storytelling, and memory. But between the theme of the work and the aesthetics textures there is a struggle for attention. Striking a balance that would not get each of the two sides lost under the central theme now rests on the shoulders of the viewer, and not the artist.

Through a critical window, Okoro’s Echoes of Extinction presents so much to digest, and perhaps gets viewers overfed such that the essence of appreciating art becomes a challenge. Some pieces of art consume the attention of the viewers based on the aesthetics energy generated by the artist. Other works’ themes take their strength from the poetic shades of the themes, creating a haven in appreciation. And when a piece of art is rich in both aesthetics and theme, something is either right or relatively stranded in between critical and commercial appreciation.

For Okoro’s Echoes of Extinction, which, supposedly, captures the urgency of the declining global environment, the texture of the piece comes with huge contrast against the theme. A piece of a seated girl with the entire canvas bathed in colourful patterns doesn’t look like an image to symbolise extinction, so the work appears through a critical lens. From the pseudo monochrome texture of the girl, to the colourful background, and the parrot placed on the girl’s folded knee and arm, Echoes of Extinction radiates enriched aesthetics that almost distracts from its theme.

Although the central theme also focuses memory and communication, the environmental urgency and extinction parts attract more attention. On the contrast and ironic context, the memory and communication part of the theme, which dominate the artistic contents, blossom in the artist’s application of the famous Ankara fabrics. Symbolic as a connection between Europe – specifically, the Dutch and Africa – the Ankara print has become popular among people in West Africa. Drenched in aesthetics, Okoro’s Echoes of Extinction escalates the beauty of the Dutch-originated African fabrics in the identity part of the theme.

In hues of brown and orange, Okoro dramatizes the beauty of the fabric as a background to the Africanness storytelling part of the piece. And as the parrot, a mimicry bird shares something in common with a section of the Ankara’s colours, the artist, again, returns to Europe. Despite the piece being a celebration of Africa and diaspora storytelling, the presence of the parrot, said to have been speaking in Scottish captures the contemporary digital connections that links the world, across cultures.

Back to Okoro’s aesthetics dexterity that nearly blurs the theme of the Echoes of Extinction mixed media. Light and its hues and shades come as a great tool in the artist’s rendition of the piece, radiating a multidimensional imagery. With a yellow spot that beams onto the Ankara print in the background, the light manipulation between the top, middle, ground and lower part of the canvas, coalesce to emboss the figure, creating 3D illusion. This much of loaded contents, relatively though, outweigh the strength of the theme of the work.