Yvonne Osei

Jan 22

Yvonne Osei’s While You’re Still Here highlights the commercial landscape along the Jefferson Avenue Bridge and celebrates the important contributions of individual workers in this region. This public vinyl installation features photographs of the hands of four employees from businesses around the area interwoven with floral imagery. For over a century, the Jefferson Avenue Bridge area has been characterized by its floral district. Hence, the work is an ode to the rich history and adopts the metaphor of flowers to capture vibrance, progressive growth, and the fragrance of a promising future.

While You’re Still Here connotes a connection between time and presence. In the spirit of Counterpublic 2023, the work serves as a memorial to everyday people (past, present, and future) whose labor, no matter how substantial or minute, contributes to the monumental growth of the St. Louis community. The effort we put in transcends us and is, in a sense, timeless because it offers a compounded advancement to the community over time that is immeasurable. The installation is a reminder to viewers: embrace your moment, understand that you are relevant, appreciate the contributions of others, and receive your flowers while you’re still here.

About the artist

Yvonne Osei is a Ghanaian multidisciplinary artist with a global creative practice characterized by public interventions that address beauty, memory and the eradication of history, racism, colonialism and the politics of clothing. Osei received her M.F.A. from Washington University in St. Louis. Her practice has been supported by several artist residencies including Cité Internationale des Arts in Paris, Fountainhead in Miami, and the Fine Arts Work Center in Provincetown. She is the recipient of the 2022 Stone & DeGuire Contemporary Art Award and the 2022 Great Rivers Biennial Award by the Contemporary Art Museum in St. Louis, where her solo exhibition “Brainchild” is on view till February 2023.