Johans Borman Fine Art / Contemporary CV's / Owusu-Ankomah

Owusu-Ankomah

Born in 1956 in Sekondi, Ghana
Lives and works in Bremen, Germany

1971 - 1974
Young student at “College of Art” (Ghanatta) in Accra/Ghana
1979 - 1985
Study trips to Europe
since 1976
Exhibitions in Africa, Europe, USA, South America and Asia

Owusu-Ankomah’s paintings can be read like a concentrated pictorial language. The artist sees his work as a retrospect, a journey into days gone-by, although his vision is very much fixed on today and tomorrow. The spiritual power of the large-format works of Owusu-Ankomah, a Ghanaian artist who lives in Germany, is absolutely fascinating. They literally almost pull the observer into a semantic world corresponding with the human figures. Owusu-Ankomah always focuses these figures – athletic, naked males – at the center of his works, permeated and superimposed by symbols. This perfect human body stands for a union of body and soul, it radiates spirituality, imparts a feeling of strength, yet without any threatening overtones at all; what comes over is dignity, mediation and energy. Owusu-Ankomah, a global artist, finds his inspiration and influences in the Renaissance - Michelangelo being one of his role models – but also in the modern European spirit and the pre-colonial art of his African home country. In his unmistakable and expressive style he combines Adinkra symbols from Ghana with other symbols from various world cultures and from all eras, and develops elements of his own new symbol language. So the semantics in his works go beyond all geographical and cultural borders.