Progression in Yellow
Reflections on Kelvin Haizel’s Yellow Clouds of High Sound
By Lizz Johnson
My first face to face introduction with Kelvin Haizel would be in 2021 as a Critlab Participant. Admittedly I had, prior to our first meeting and due to the rise in interest in the Art scene in Ghana, heard of his work and seen a few images, however, my first interaction with him, along with a proper investigation into his work started in 2021. My interest in Kelvin Haizel’s work would immediately rise from a genuine interest in his use of the ‘splash of colors’ ( in my words) on canvas and the fact that he was one of the few artists working in abstraction who had stuck to this painterly form despite the rise in the ever popular black body portraits that was defining black art at the time. In one of our early engagements, although swift and exchanged light- heartedly, I would ask Kelvin why he hadn't hopped on the Black Bodies trend as an established artist who could possibly profit from the new gaze on us with a little strategic move. His response? ‘I like to stay in my lane and evolve. It's just not for me”. Of course he did not mean any shade or sub, like the Gen - Z’s like to say, however we did laugh over that more so because his response was in Twi which made it a bit more comical( it is in a way only an understanding of the language can relay the comic effect and innuendos-if any!).
Reflecting on his response resonated with me and would be a key point of reference over the years as I interacted with, and in some cases worked with artists in Accra and and beyond as the wave for black art and artists from Ghana picked up. It's now 2025 and currently, there is a subtle but very obvious standstill with the interest in black body image art and a shift in the kinds of artists from Ghana and Africa who remain relevant in their practice. In a recent article written by Rachel Corbett written for Vulture; How the Black portraiture Boom Went Bust (The racial reckoning of 2020 sent prices soaring. Now no one is buying ), the essay examines the staleness that has quietly hit the Art market and industry particularly in Africa. It is why Kelvin’s comment back in 2021 although a joke resonated and continues to with time. The most important point to highlight being the ways in which artists who stuck to their practice and evolved with it have been able to stay relevant beyond trends and waves that shove the art world here and there.
Taking it back again to 2021, there was an undeniable rise in audience interactions with art and indeed the need and space for more exhibitions. Never mind that locals could not afford the
work. Art was in trend and people needed to be found at the latest exhibition. The soar in Black art and artists from Ghana saw a more mass appeal to engage with art, artists and exhibitions. Black bodies and portraiture made the art more understandable by sight even if curatorial statements needed a few read throughs and abstract art was not as popular. But there was Haizel and his practice. Looking back now, I may describe his work as refreshing. For it was one of the few that hung in huge exhibitions in Accra that was different. Undeniably however, for those that sought to engage with his work, the appeal came with the artist's practicality in his approach to speaking about his inspiration.
Haizel's painterly abstraction is process driven and its inspiration makes it more engaging beyond the strokes and lines of abstraction as a foreign concept. It was easy to speak to artists and hear them mention inspiration from Basquiat, Picasso, Van Gogh etc which by no means calls their bluff on their inspiration. However, hearing Kelvin express his inspiration coming from the paint shops and from other Ghanaian artists such as Atta Kwami, was a refreshing take. Abstract art? Paint shops and your everyday painter and his tools? Almost like the light bulb tick ( again I draw from Gen-z lingua to describe the eureka moment), my first hearing of such immediate and practical inspiration brought to mind the idea of how we are so consumed and taken by foreign packages of art and by extension creativity. So much that it was hard to see that inspiration, especially for abstract art by a Ghanaian artist could come from the city or within his immediate space. It is unfortunately a bigger of an issue than I had realized falling victim to this myself .There is an almost impossibility of immediate-environment-inspiration many artists and by extension creatives lack due to an outward look as the pinnacle of greatness and the need for global appeal.Here we are with a Ghanaian abstract artist being inspired by painters from across the street and applying it into a style of art that doesn't aim to represent the real world as it is, but instead uses elements like lines, shapes, colors, and forms to create compositions that may exist independently from visual references in the world.
Here in Accra, his most recent exhibition was at the Foundation for Contemporary Art Ghana in Cantonment adjacent to the Du Bois Center. The Exhibition titled Babysitting a Shark in a Coldroom was an iteration of an exhibition first opened in Zurich in 2019.Parts of it have also been shown in Lagos, Stellenbosch, and Roubaix. The series of photographs was from a staged performance in the defunct cold-room company that was used to preserve the bodies of 115 nationals when an airplane belonging to Ethiopian Airlines crashed on the island in 1996. This showcased Haizel’s versatility and how his abstraction found itself even in his photography. But it was his 2023 show We Do Not Sleep to Dream that was shown at Gallery 1957 that focused entirely on his painterly abstraction. The excerpt below from the curatorial statement explores more on the impact of his inspiration.
In this exhibition, what emerges are echoes of visual stimuli [abstractions], characteristic of specific interactions that the artist has had in cities across the world, which would have birthed an epiphanic moment. As described by Haizel, these moments may be linked to cursorily seeing someone engaged in the mundane gesture of wiping paint-mixing sticks onto a crusty surface or testing the resultant mix of paint on just any surface available in the paint store. The palpable abstract aesthetics generated, which serves as profound testaments to the transactional process, subsequently becomes the source of inspiration for the current body of works.
As far as Haizel's practice goes, the above extract from the curatorial statement clarifies the evident reach for balance when it comes to his work. While this may not be an obvious intentionality by the artist himself, extended interaction and study of his work does by itself highlight this. Thus, from the above extract we see the needed intervention of a layer of “seriousness” or perhaps a better word “complexity” attached to the work for global appeal that sits comfortably at the top of how art should be engaged with strategically, politically and also importantly economically, and the capturing of simplicity , obviousness and a sense of immediate local awareness when the artist then speaks about his work or interacts with an audience about his work. As much as this has been explored through the lens of focusing on the artist interacting with their finished work , it is not far-fetched to enquire when really does the interaction begin, especially once the artist lays out the importance of their immediate environment playing a vital role in the foundation of their starting point. So before the body of work is realized, what or where really is the starting point? What initiates the coming together of colours in the mind's eye before they are finally rested upon and rest on canvas? What thoughts ignite the forming of shapes and forms when the work comes together?
In the first part of this essay, I have attempted to piece together the salient and important aspects of Kelvin's work ending with a rhetorical or two; a subtle preamble to this next part. We may not be able to answer these questions but what they do present are extras of an evolving practice and deeper inquiry into practice. Simplicity still remains a core value but we proceed now, focusing on a new body of work that ultimately explores all this.
A studio visit finds me staring at the yellow pieces of work scattered around the studio. Now named, (previously unnamed at the time of my visit) , the piece titled A Dance in the Yellow Rains caught my attention first.
At first glance, my vision forms the image of a dark unicorn perhaps ascending while people looked up at it. However, as the piece slowly registered, I then see the scene with Satan in the Day of Rapture scene in the Disney classic Fantasia(1940). While these different images continued to take shape in my mind, what was very interesting to realize was the psychology of familiarity and the cognitive power of forming things we are used to or know to make meaning of the abstract. As in the case of Haizel, as a spectator I see things in his art only familiar to me and these things form the more I stare at a piece.It was the same with all the pieces. Almost like standing in a yellow cloud making shapes and sizes of things. We can only make things out of clouds that we know.
Haizel's studio sits atop his two-storey house where he lives with his family. Just below his studio, his partner’s fashion studio is nestled below and it is easy to imagine that on a busy day, the rhythmic whirring of the sewing machines while the sousing and sliding sounds of hands on canvas are made. What does this impose on the artist while he works? Many of the pieces like Horses do fly too, just without wings, Reality of Fiction and of course my favourite, A Dance in the Yellow Rain perhaps show what the artist's immediate environment contributes to his work without him knowing.
In this body of work, It was hard not to notice the dominating colour that characterizes the collection. Unlike previous works in which warmer and cooler hues of colourful blotches were engaged, the colour yellow dominates this series. While the artist presents it in his usual selection of warmer tone, the dominating colour is still hard to ignore and defines the collection becoming bold and different with the way he presents his abstract work.
The conversation with Kelvin Haizel kicked off almost immediately, the artist explained that this new body of work was tipping a different tow from his previous work. For one, he was reading materials and developing an even more acute interest in his immediate environment and the things that have influenced other people in similar environments. Atta Kwami's Kumasi Realism is a huge read for him as he embarks on the journey of this body of work but what piqued my interest was the reading of Prof.John Collins’s Highlife Giants: West African Dance and Band Pioneers. In response to the question about why he was reading on music, he did playfully respond to it as saying Artists also like music, but on a more serious note, the goal for this body of work was to engage with more critical work beyond Art written in and for Ghana.
The idea of the canvas as a painters wall and the product of residue in a painters shop as a final piece of art is still a rooted starting point for Haizel as realized through our conversation, although it was also noticeable the need to explore how external influences also impact the work while sticking to its core. Indeed, the art pieces from Yellow Clouds of High Sound ( were i the
curator this would be the name I would suggest to the artist) were a good blend of both, ultimately a successful trial for what the artist set out to do both consciously and in my consideration unconsciously especially on the part of the audience as a consumer of his work.
Another observation I took from the studio visit and a look at the work before reaching finalization was that, The works in the Yellow Clouds of High Sound do feel like you can hear them. Another thing that struck me while engaging with some of the pieces like Reality of Fiction and Let’s live a little longer than Tomorrow was how much they reminded me of Jazz influenced art that was very popular in the mid 60s and 70s slowly dying in the early 80s. These were abstract and modernist artists who explored sound and music through their work. Artists like Jean-Michel Basquiat ( interestingly) and Jackson Pollock were heavily influenced by Jazz which was reflected in some of their works. It brought to mind the question of ever coming across a Ghanaian artist whose work was influenced by Highlife music between the 60s-80s when the styles of music was all the rave. There was none I could think of. Perhaps not because they did not exist but because there hadn't been some investigation into the possibilities by curators or writers. However, here I was in Kelvin Haizel’s studio staring at these paintings and realizing that what the odds were that the artist, in reading John Collins’s work Highlife Time was doing something similar, unconsciously projecting Highlife ensembles into his abstract pieces. If you know, you see it. It was an interesting insight to see his genuine shock when I pointed this out to him while holding the book cover over one of his paintings. We laughed about it, the cover with the highlife ensemble unconsciously inspiring the artist. The artist unconsciously leaning towards yellow and olive green hues of the book. The idea of clusters comes from the ensemble's images in the books. We weren't thinking too hard. He may not have noticed but they were all there.
The Disney Classic, Fantasia( 1940) which was an attempt by the Walt Disney label to popularise Classical Music for a more expanded audience presented the music and its movements through the themes of colors, moods and shapes while also relying on popular characters such as Mickey Mouse and the dancing Hippos to carry the audience along. This brings me to the point about almost hearing the works as you take them in. The artist, who would be hearing about Fantasia for the first time during our conversation, was very taken aback by the immediate links made and noted to watch the over 2 hour production. It is hard to know if Walt Disney indeed succeeded in this attempt, but in Accra looking at these pieces and seemingly drawing similarities, Kelvin does succeed in making his paintings heard be you reminded of a rhythm or song, the mind is moved to music by just staring at the pieces.
There is a lot of movement in the works, so much so that one may miss a thing or two or perhaps it is better to say, one will come to a thing or two the longer you keep your eyes on a piece. For nothing really is missed if one does not have any connection or experience that will cognitively trigger the familiarity to take form. The dazzle of this body of work is that it keeps the mind stuck on it while the eyes unknowingly dance around the surfaces forming shapes of things and symbols as if staring at the moving clouds on a sunny day and coming up with all sorts of shapes
and things that the eyes mind draws. A dog, a horse, a trumpet , lines and crosses of mathematical value of which the artist will explain his three-year-old daughter would impose on the work being in the years of imitation every child goes through. Subconsciously, she imposes her study of numbers and alphabets onto the pieces and I am left to wonder if this is the same imposition that the bay graft cloth that found their way into some of the work pieces also represented. His studio, as mentioned earlier does sit on top of his partner’s fashion studio after all and as an artist curious about the ways in which one's immediate environment and experiences is expressed on canvas, these do come to life exceptionally well in that regard. However, he tells me the frayed cloth is a way to aestheticise the excesses of canvas joining. That was hacks back to his own childhood where they would fray grey-baft fabric in Life Skills Class when he was in elementary school.
There are many turns the conversation took. The artist expressed his thoughts on the global art market and its impact on Ghana, the immediate art scene in Ghana and its evolution. His practice and upcoming shows. The thin lines between commercial and purposeful art making and intention and the urgency of a more subtle and simple approach to art discussions and interactions in Ghana. Although veering off very far away from the new body of work at point, the urgency for exploring the effects of consumption being poured onto canvas is very evident in this new body of work. It's an art meets psychology conversation which this essay has in some way lingered around. The impact of yellow and its vibrancy evoking fond memories or playful thoughts. In Yellow Clouds of High Sound the artist takes us on a journey on how the idea of a painter's tools to the consumption of sound and how it is translated on canvas are all very possible with the strokes, blotches, dubs, drips,… of paint and the curiosity and unconscious impact of awareness and interaction. This somewhat answers the question on where a body of work begins. Often in the mind but before then, a combination of the subconscious making meaning and bringing together the energies from experiences and everyday consumption be it conversation, music, words, or observation of the movement of snails, or the sounds of sewing machines while the artist sits atop his cloud staring at the canvas.
References
We Do Not Sleep to Dream Curatorial statement (2024) written by Ato Annan
How the Black portraiture Boom Went Bust (2025) by Rachel Corbett.
Mentions
Atta Kwami, Kumasi Realism (2011)
Fantasia( 1940)
John Collins Highlife Giants: West African Dance and Band Pioneers.(2017)
Jean-Michel Basquiat Jackson Pollock Critlab
Appendix
Other Pieces in the Series
Works