Rising Painter Emma Prempeh Explores Identity and Home in Her Domestic Interiors
Portrait of Emma Prempeh by Ellyse Anderson. Courtesy of the artist and Tiwani Contemporary.
Emma Prempeh was born in the U.K. Her mother, however, was born on the Caribbean island of Saint Vincent, and her father in Ghana. “It’s the experience of so many diaspora kids to not really know where you belong,” said Prempeh in an interview with Artsy. “You can say it’s cliché but I don’t think it is.”
These themes of the ambiguity of identity and the search for home form a throughline in “Wandering Under a Shifting Sun,” her current solo exhibition at Tiwani Contemporary, on view through November 16th. Her paintings, such as Entry Point (2024), which depicts a lush green tree as seen through the gap between heavy curtains, display the evocative domestic darkness Prempeh has become so adept at playing with. This painting represents the murky limbo of being unsure of one’s home in contrast with the stark, solid light of the outdoors.
The installation setup also demonstrates Prempeh’s current focus on the idea of home. In one corner in particular, a trinity of paintings (The Boys Quarters, Lydia’s House, and Tante Winnie’s sister, all 2024) are mounted on darkened walls above a broad rug and lit by the warm light of a single lamp. The whole affair reads like a cozy living room that could be anywhere in the world, suggesting that home is something beyond any fixed space; it is a sense of belonging.
Earlier this year, Prempeh made trips to both of her parents’ home countries. “Being able to take my mum back to Saint Vincent is my greatest achievement,” she said. “She hadn’t been back home since she was 16.” The artist’s time in Saint Vincent was instrumental in crafting this latest body of work: Not only did she capture several of the photographs her paintings are based upon during this time, it was also where she developed deeper concepts about what home means.
Her trip to visit her father in Ghana, on the other hand, provoked ruminations on what it means to be alone. Her father wasn’t always present in her life and she experienced loneliness at times in response to this. “The isolation I was feeling is there in the project but only a little bit,” she said after thinking about it for a moment. This separation is visible in Other Side of the Table (2024), which illustrates a subtle shadow around the subject, in Prempeh’s distinctive dark impressionistic aesthetic.
Prempeh, who was born in 1996, has been developing her style nearly all her life. Even though her family weren’t necessarily artistic, she began painting early on. “My mum isn’t creative and my dad doesn’t draw so I’ve always wondered where it came from,” she said. “But since we were little there has always been creativity in the house and it was supported.” In fact, the first painting she remembered having real desire to create was of a life-size ballerina on her bedroom wall at the age of nine. “When I was 16, I repainted my room and it took five layers of paint to cover up the shine in her eyes,” she recounted.
This inclination to paint subjects on a whim was encouraged by her time at the Royal College of Art, where she studied from 2020 to 2022. “I met lots of abstract artists at the RCA and I learned how to be looser with things like background,” she said. “I don’t need to completely fill out all the details.” This artistic approach is reflected in how she even chooses what to paint. “I don’t actually decide, ‘Oh I want to paint this’ ahead of time. I just take pictures and document things,” she said, noting she had snapped shots of trips, her mother, and her daily life. “It’s when I look at it after that I decide what can go on to become a painting.”
Prempeh is still in the ascension period of her career, but she is cognizant of what appeals to her as an artist. Her work is full of style, thought, and questions, yet she is centered in her clarity of what matters the most. “As much as the work is asking, ‘What is home?’ I know that I have always found home in my loved ones: my friends and family,” she said.
