Diaspora Dialogs [.com]

Born in 1980, Oneika Russell is a fine artist working in Kingston with digital media and traditional media. Her work is generally made up of drawings, objects, digital animations and video. The artist started off her career working in oil on canvas but her interest in moving image aesthetics has shifted her work to more process oriented drawings and videos. She creates fictional characters in the manner of an animator or storyteller and then places them in environments which they can live out their individual fates. Much of this work is done as drawings which then become digital animations. Earlier work dwelt on the character of a faceless little girl trapped within a domestic world of feminine patterns and genteel furniture. Later work used an Aunt Jemima figurine negotiating her way through a Victorian social setting.The work featured in the show employs characters based on the Abu Graihb image of a tortured prisoner and the tragic figure of Shakespeare’s Ophelia. Russell lives and works in St. Andrew, Jamaica.