What power do our collective and individual choices have on the destruction or elevation of our humble human experience?

The latest solo exhibition from the visual artist VILLAGER (born AbdulRasheed Adekunle Esuwapelumi Adaranijo in Nigeria), contemplates this existential question and others through a vibrant series of divinely informed portrait paintings.

On view Oct. 10 through Dec. 17 at the Bromo Mezzanine Gallery, “Ase: Embodying the Divine” combines both abstract and figurative painting techniques to conjure a style of portraiture the artist calls AfroAbstracture. VILLAGER considers portraiture more than a replication of someone’s likeness; it can be a mirror for their innate divinity, and devoting their practice to this process is, in turn, a reflection of their own chosen path.

“We are all mirrors of one another,” VILLAGER shared during a recent studio visit. “Ultimately, the folks I paint are those who mirror something within me and propel me towards radical healing. Painting them is my way of giving back, honoring their story and immortalizing them so the world can also sing their good gospels. I’m at all times giving reverence to this collective consciousness.”

In the Yoruba cosmology, Ase is a subtle primordial life force, a divine essence that catalyzes and sustains all existence. Using acrylics on canvas, VILLAGER attempts to channel this energy into dynamic portraits, invoking concepts such as Iwa, character and essential nature, and translates the techniques of traditional Yoruba weavers and woodworkers. Rather than paint their subjects with skin, they utilize a gestural mark-making akin to scarification. They apply varying strokes of color to create a tapestry that imagines the way auric energy emits and travels through networked channels in our bodies. Each of VILLAGER’s portraits engages this technique, and by doing so, enlivens the portrayals of their subjects with a distinct approach to figuration.

VILLAGER’s portraits also reference the austere and proud postures of Ile Ife bronzes and serially honor Esu, the Orisa of crossroads, the enforcer of all divine laws and balance, by replacing the sitter’s eyes and mouth with cowrie shells. The cowries placed on the eyes are called oju, inu.

“In Yoruba and the African diaspora, cowries are revered as a vessel/object significant as adornment through jewelry, currency, trade networks, rituals, ceremonies, and ancestral veneration practices,” VILLAGER continued. “Cowries in my work become the technology of energetic connection to the divine life force and all that is hidden, unseen, around it. They are a symbol of connection with my ancestors, a vessel of knowledge, a seed carrying ancestral wisdom from the past to the present. This vessel becomes a portal of gaze to transport me to a space where time is endless, and energy is the fuel for inevitable change.”

Organized by BOPA senior curator Kirk Shannon-Butts, the exhibit marks the third iteration of the “Emerge Baltimore” series, which provides platforms to showcase new works by Baltimore-based emerging artists.

“We no longer have to wait for the artist to pass in order to discover their work, their story and learn all about why they felt compelled to share their journey with the public,” says Shannon-Butts. “It is important to exhibit VILLAGER at this time because they are the demiurgic manifestation of now.”

A self-taught artist, VILLAGER emigrated from Lagos, Nigeria, to Maryland in 2013 with their siblings to live with their mother. After studying environmental chemistry at Towson University and nearly completing their M.S. in marine estuary environmental sciences at UMBC, they became gravely ill. They said they miraculously healed after making peace with their desire to be a professional artist. Since then, VILLAGER has practiced a daily meditation of mindful self-acceptance and uses their art to help others accept their beauty by accepting themselves as they are. The artist describes this process and the portraits they prolifically paint as rituals of remembrance.

Two years ago, they debuted early experiments with similar themes and techniques in thier first solo exhibition, “BUSH BOY!” at the Chesapeake Arts Center. Those paintings acknowledged ancestral presence and traditional knowledge in more literal ways: depictions of artifacts, masks and cowrie shells. With “Ase: Embodying the Divine,” VILLAGER digs deeper into the conceptual ideation of ancestral traditions by mindfully documenting the subtle sacredness of our material and immaterial world. VILLAGER has honed a definitive and memorable style by studying the scholarship of Malidoma Some, Dr. Marimba, Ben Okri, Robert Farris Thompson and the powerful artistry of visual artists Amako Boafo, Amy Sherald, El Anatsui, Simone Leigh and Masimba Hwat.

VILLAGER has the kind of personality that people are drawn to, a warmth reflected in the portraits they paint, each a likeness that allows us all to see ourselves as we are — vibrant light beings, innately joyful and divine. By emphasizing the vibrancy of what they believe reflects their sitter’s true nature and distinct energetic signature in the world, VILLAGER hopes their paintings remind us about the power of our interconnected reality; we can heal ourselves and each other by honoring our humanity.

“Ase: Embodying the Divine” is on view through Dec. 17 in the Mezzanine Gallery at the Bromo Seltzer Arts Tower in Baltimore.