Ouattara Watts Paintings at KARMA

James Kalm has been bumping in to the work of Ouattara Watts since some of his first presentations here in New York in the early 1990s. Although a native of the Ivory Coast, Ouattara studied in Paris for a decade, before moving to New York at the invitation of Jean-Michel Basquiat in 1988, and has been painting here for the last twenty-five years. The artist creates large pictures that are a conglomeration of materials, techniques and references, that keep the viewer mystified, and the sensual observer satisfied. The canvases are fabricated from collaged fabrics, photos, patterns, the use of decorative boarders, and geometric figures with mysterious number sequences, to structure areas of distressed colors. As the title of one painting implies “Traveler of the Cosmos” Watts collects timeless ideas from all over the world, and depicts them briskly, as if the paintings are pages from his galactic travel log. This program was recorded May 5, 2022. #jameskalmreport #jameskalmroughcut #lorenmunk