Since earning an MFA in Painting and Drawing from the School of the Art Institute of Chicago last year, painter Luke Agada’s career has taken off. Early showings at group exhibitions spanning continents—“Collective Reflection: Contemporary African and Diasporic Expressions of a New Vanguard” at Gallery 1957 in Accra, “Unusual Suspects” at African Artists’ Foundation in Lagos and “Where The Wild Roses Grow” at Berlin’s Kristin Hjellegjerde Gallery—established Agada as an artist with a knack for expressing cultural identity, ambiguity and introspection in surrealist works rendered in color palettes reminiscent of his native Lagos. His first U.S. solo exhibition at Chicago’s Monique Meloche Gallery in September of 2023 was followed by a standout showing at Art Basel Miami Beach, where Roberts Projects featured his work in what quickly became one of the fair’s most buzzed-about booths.

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All this from someone who not terribly long ago was making and selling paintings in his spare time while pursuing a degree in veterinary medicine. But just a year into his veterinary career, the Nigerian-born, Chicago-based artist quit to focus on art full-time—a pivot that involved moving from Lagos to the U.S.

“Far from home, with little familiarity and no family nearby, I experienced a constant sense of longing and nostalgia that eventually permeated my work,” Agada told Observer. “The figures I depicted began to reflect fragments of my memories, reduced to simplified forms, shadows and lines—mere vestiges of my past. I sought ways to navigate this longing and explore how the migrant form adapts to globalized spaces.”

Agada’s style is a confluence of Surrealism and postcolonial theory, and much of his work explores the “third space” concept popularized by Homi K. Bhabha. With earthy tones, shadow and light, he depicts clashes of memory and migration in psychologically engaging landscapes where intersecting cultural identities and shifting power dynamics create tension-filled environs populated by distortions representing not individuals but states of being.

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On the occasion of the opening of “Between Two Suns,” the artist’s first solo show in Los Angeles now on at Roberts Projects, Observer connected with Agada to discuss his influences, how his life’s journey has shaped his work and what he hopes people will take away from the show. With his star on the rise, expect to see more of him.

The surreal distortion........

© Observer