Kip Omolade is celebrated for his brightly colored oil paintings of humanoid faces that explore themes such as immortality, social performance, and the human psyche.Born in Harlem, New York, Omolade began his art career as a graffiti artist while interning at Marvel Comics and The Center for African Art.

He continued his studies at The Art Students League of New York and earned a BFA at the School of Visual Arts.The paintings in his different series examine contemporary beauty standards and the notion that people present a masked version of themselves to the world.

The artist’s process involves creating a mold and cast of a model’s face, and producing a resin version of the cast, to which a layer of chrome is then added.The final sculpture, which is adorned with false eyelashes, is then used as the model for Omolade’s dazzling paintings.

Omolade explains the work by saying, “(For instance) My Diovadiova Chrome portraits historically connect to ancient, realistic African sculptures such as Benin ivory masks and Ife bronze heads.“The oil paintings are psychological studies that investigate immortality, the universal masks we all wear and contemporary notions of beauty and luxury.”More of Kip Omolade’s remarkable art can be found at https://www.kipomolade.com/.