Luke Agada’s practice examines themes of globalization, migration, and cultural dislocation within the framework of a postcolonial world and its impact on neo-cultural evolution. His surrealist paintings of disembodied figures and dreamlike grounds explore identity and the transformation of the postmodern human, where time and space produce complex bodies of difference. By overlapping the past and present, the self and the other, Agada reflects on the ambiguity of identity through post-structuralist thought. His work draws on the writings of Homi Bhabha and Edward Said, as well as literary works by Nigerian authors Chinua Achebe and Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie, forming an ongoing investigation into history, critical theory, and cultures of dominance shaped by globalization.
Agada (b. 1992, Lagos, Nigeria) received his MFA in Painting and Drawing from the School of the Art Institute of Chicago (2023) and a DVM from the Federal University of Agriculture, Abeokuta (2018). He has presented solo exhibitions at moniquemeloche, Chicago, IL (2025; 2023) and Roberts Projects, Los Angeles, CA (2024), and will present forthcoming solo exhibitions with Sean Kelly Gallery, New York, NY and at Roberts Projects, Los Angeles, CA in 2026. His work has been exhibited nationally and internationally at Gagosian, New York, NY; African American Museum in Philadelphia, Philadelphia, PA; Kristin Hjellegjerde Gallery, Berlin, Germany; Hive Center for Contemporary Art, Beijing, China; African Artists’ Foundation, Lagos, Nigeria; and Gallery 1957, Accra, Ghana. He will also participate in a forthcoming group exhibition at Efie Gallery, Dubai, UAE in 2026.
He has received numerous awards and fellowships including Newcity’s Breakout Artist (2024); the Studios at MASS MoCA Fellowship (2023); the James Nelson Raymond Fellowship Award (2023); Dean’s Grant, School of the Art Institute of Chicago (2023); the Janet and Russell Doubleday Award at The Art Students League of New York (2022); the Helen Frankenthaler Award at SAIC (2022); the George and Ann Siegel Award, School of the Art Institute of Chicago (2021); and the Global Warming International Art Prize, New York, NY (2020). Agada currently lives and works in Chicago, IL.