Before returning to New York, curator Larry Ossei-Mensah visited the Ceramics Department at the Kwame Nkrumah University of Science and Technology (KNUST), where, following an introduction by Eugene Ofori Agyei to Prof. Samuel Nortey, he delivered a lecture that engaged and inspired students and faculty alike.
Ossei-Mensah is an internationally recognized curator, co-founder of Artnoir, and cultural critic whose work centers on amplifying emerging and established voices across the African diaspora.
Known for his interdisciplinary approach bridging contemporary art, performance, and popular culture, he has curated exhibitions for major institutions and public platforms, shaping critical discourse around global contemporary art.
Reflecting on his visit to KNUST, Ossei-Mensah said the experience gave him deeper insight into Agyei’s artistic energy, resilience, and the driving force behind his evolving body of work.
The visit, he noted, deepened his appreciation for the personal and cultural narratives embedded in the artist’s practice.
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Shortly after returning to the United States, Ossei-Mensah travelled to Alfred University, widely regarded as one of the world’s leading centers for ceramic art, to participate in the 21st Annual Perkins Lecture.
Held at the Alfred Ceramic Art Museum, New York, the event brought together artist and alumnus Eugene Ofori Agyei and Ossei-Mensah for an intimate and expansive conversation on artistic practice, materiality, and migration.
Agyei, a Ghanaian-born artist and educator currently based in the United States, works across ceramics, textiles, and found objects. His interdisciplinary practice explores the emotional and psychological terrain of migration, tracing what it means to leave, arrive, and inhabit in-between spaces.
Through immersive installations, he interrogates identity, belonging, and cultural hybridity, often drawing on personal histories and diasporic memory.
The lecture coincided with Agyei’s exhibition, Fihankra, currently on view at the Alfred Ceramic Art Museum. Together, artist and curator reflected on artistic origins, material experimentation, and the evolving arc of Agyei’s practice.
Their dialogue moved across geographies and lived experiences, reflecting on journeys across continents, the complexities of sustaining a creative life, and the role of materials particularly clay, alongside fabric, wood, and found objects as sites of play, resistance, and reimagination.
The conversation offered a candid look at how ideas take shape both in the studio and through curatorial framing; while also illuminating the ways artists and curators collaboratively construct meaning, bridging personal histories with broader cultural narratives.
Ossei-Mensah described his visits to KNUST and Alfred, New York as deeply meaningful, noting that the opportunity to engage directly with Agyei’s work, explore the museum, and spend time with students strengthened his connection to clay as both material and cultural language.
Ultimately, the Perkins Lecture served not only as a celebration of Fihankra, on view through July 19, but also as a testament to the power of dialogue across disciplines, geographies, and lived experiences in shaping contemporary art and its futures
