Odette Graskie (b.1993) is a contemporary artist from Johannesburg, South Africa. She works with paper, artists’ books, and drawing. Her artworks investigate human interaction, intimacy and affective connection. Most recently Graskie exhibited the solo show Drawing as Movement at the Karoo National Arts Festival in Oudtshoorn, South Africa. In 2023, Graskie completed her MA in Visual Arts with the University of Johannesburg, culminating in her solo exhibition a line, a thread, a conversation at Berman Contemporary. The focus of her thesis was the relationship between sitter, artist and artwork in an interventive portraiture practice. Graskie is also a Junior Bookbinder at Pulp Paperworks. She has also participated in artist residencies locally in Howick, KZN, as well as internationally in Britain, Guernsey and Poland. Her recent group exhibitions include Pretty Brilliant and ARTladies at Berman Contemporary; ellipsis: approximations to a voice at the University of the Free State Art Gallery in Bloemfontein; and Making and Interpreting Art, hosted by the South African Research Chair. She also exhibited at the 2022 1-54 Contemporary African Art Fair in London and the 2024 Investec Cape Town Art Fair.
Artist's Statement
Working with drawing, installation and paper, I create portrait-worlds, wherein the faces of real people (who have given permission and been involved in the agentic qualities of their portraits) become enmeshed and intertwined in each other. These portrait-worlds have become the language of my own emotive expression. I collect portraits through interactive drawing performance, where I converse with subjects and get to know them very briefly. These interactions are multisensorial, and the conversation and other sensory information blends with the visual to create a different kind of drawing. These drawings then are reused and redrawn, and I make paper sculptures and installations.
Within my installations, I hope to create spaces for wonder in my audience. Wonder, as defined by Sara Ahmed, becomes a way of redefining what we see and experience. “Wonder expands our field of vision and touch. Wonder is the precondition of the exposure of the subject to the world: we wonder when we are moved by that which we face.” Wonder can stir up emotions and create movement. I use portraiture as a relational device in the creation of space, and specifically space for connection. Connection, I believe, is a way to truly challenge our perceptions of the world. Wonder can thus challenge our perceptions.
With my work involving handmade paper, paper artworks and artists’ books I also invite tactility. Themes of intimacy and emotionality are embedded in the artworks. They are an opportunity for viewers to engage on a purposeful (page-turning, stepping-into) level with artworks based on emotions. This has had different reactions from viewers - many respond with willing participation and openness, while others reject the intimacy of many eyes on them in the portraits. My recent work included a series of paper tunnel sculptures wherein the viewers could become a part of the drawings through their presence and interaction with the work. I hope to create moments of emotive movement with my work.
Artist's Statement
Working with drawing, installation and paper, I create portrait-worlds, wherein the faces of real people (who have given permission and been involved in the agentic qualities of their portraits) become enmeshed and intertwined in each other. These portrait-worlds have become the language of my own emotive expression. I collect portraits through interactive drawing performance, where I converse with subjects and get to know them very briefly. These interactions are multisensorial, and the conversation and other sensory information blends with the visual to create a different kind of drawing. These drawings then are reused and redrawn, and I make paper sculptures and installations.
Within my installations, I hope to create spaces for wonder in my audience. Wonder, as defined by Sara Ahmed, becomes a way of redefining what we see and experience. “Wonder expands our field of vision and touch. Wonder is the precondition of the exposure of the subject to the world: we wonder when we are moved by that which we face.” Wonder can stir up emotions and create movement. I use portraiture as a relational device in the creation of space, and specifically space for connection. Connection, I believe, is a way to truly challenge our perceptions of the world. Wonder can thus challenge our perceptions.
With my work involving handmade paper, paper artworks and artists’ books I also invite tactility. Themes of intimacy and emotionality are embedded in the artworks. They are an opportunity for viewers to engage on a purposeful (page-turning, stepping-into) level with artworks based on emotions. This has had different reactions from viewers - many respond with willing participation and openness, while others reject the intimacy of many eyes on them in the portraits. My recent work included a series of paper tunnel sculptures wherein the viewers could become a part of the drawings through their presence and interaction with the work. I hope to create moments of emotive movement with my work.
