Merikokeb Berhanu Untitled II, 2010

Untitled II is an acrylic painting on canvas, made by Merikokeb Berhanu while she was still living and working in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia—a prolific period for the artist. The distinct color palette is characteristic of works from this moment before the artist's move to the United States in 2017.

Merikokeb Berhanu work combines abstract and representational elements, forging a distinct formal vocabulary. Her biomorphic imagery evokes associations with life: Rounded shapes invoke cells, buds, seed pods, or embryonic life, suggesting processes of conception, gestation, reproduction, or birth – underlying themes that are more intuited than stated. Circular forms recall celestial bodies such as sun or moon, but can also be positioned as a figure’s head, organ or, in a formal vocabulary that powerfully destabilizes our sense of scale, even as a cellular structure. Equally fluid in their meaning are Merikokeb’s representations of the human body: individual feet or hands become visible but embody a more generalized human presence; elongated shapes with rounded heads could represent plants or a group of men or women. References to animal life draw on an understanding of the connectedness of all life-forms.