Recognized for her chameleonic approach to art, Ayedun is deeply engaged in mobilizing young audiences and fostering cultural awareness through contemporary art.
Igi Lola Ayedun is a multimedia artist and cultural organizer working across painting, video, 3D digital sculpture, photography, and sound, based between São Paulo and Paris. She is the founder and director of HOA, a nonprofit organization with a situationist influence dedicated to a decolonial perspective on contemporary art, focusing on artists from the global majority.
Her artistic research explores the cultural and biological significance of color, with a particular emphasis on blue. Investigating the global trade routes of indigo, the historical legacy of lapis lazuli, and the transformative power of minerals, Ayedun reconstructs life cycles through materiality and visual translations of her dreams. She sees the fusion of ancestral and contemporary technologies as a spiritual method of preserving African heritage for the future. Igi Lola Ayedun's work also revisits textile traditions through the history of the Silk Road, exploring the intersections between ancient trade routes, material culture, and contemporary artistic practices.
With an extensive editorial career, Igi began her journey nearly 20 years ago in journalism and has been recognized by Visionaire (USA) as a prodigy of her generation, contributing to national and international publications such as Vogue, Elle, L'Officiel, Harper's Bazaar, O Estado de São Paulo, O Globo, Marie Claire, I-D Magazine, among others. Recently, Igi was named one of the 10 women currently leading the Brazilian art market by Folha de São Paulo.
During French President Emmanuel Macron's visit to Brazil in March 2023, Igi was selected as one of the leading Brazilian figures in culture, sports, and literature to attend a dinner with the French Head of State in São Paulo and participate in a consultative panel. She contributed to creating guidelines for the cross-season celebration of the Year of Brazil in France and the Year of France in Brazil, focusing on her dedicated engagement with youth culture.
Her artistic work has been exhibited at Pivô/IMS, winner of the ZUM Photography Prize from the Moreira Salles Institute, the MAR – Museum of Art of Rio de Janeiro, the MIS – Museum of Image and Sound, the Pinacoteca of São Paulo, Christie’s Rockefeller Plaza – New York, the Tomie Ohtake Institute, ETOPIA Center for Art and Technology – Zaragoza, Teatro Oficina, Itaú Cultural, among others. Ayedun is distinguished by her chameleonic professionalism, her ability to mobilize popular youth, and her dedicated work in raising cultural awareness among young people through contemporary art, creating opportunities and interactive experiences.