Tomilola Olumide is an artist and researcher whose practice documents memory and identity through autobiographical work informed by her present experiences and formative years in Lagos, Nigeria. 

She is a Sir Frank Bowling Scholar and holds an MA in Contemporary Art Practice from the Royal College of Art and a BA in Fine Art from the University of Southampton, Winchester School of Art.

 

Moving between play, remembrance and engagement with the intuitive and mundane, her practice is process-led and materially grounded. She uses materials as intimate extensions of self, guided not only by their physical qualities but by the stories they carry and the resonance they hold, exploring subjects through tactile engagement, muscle memory, and interdisciplinary methods that span installation, sculpture, textiles, ceramics, writing and performance. 

 

Her investigations in glass and copper have led her into the practices of kiln-cast vitreous enamel and metalsmithing, research she began developing at STEAMhouse Birmingham and the Royal College of Art. She continues this work through self-directed studio research and training across metalsmithing, ceramics, and textiles, working between London and Birmingham. 

 

Her work has been shown at institutions including the Royal College of Art, The New Art Gallery Walsall, Copeland Gallery, Outhouse Gallery, Stryx Gallery, Eastside Projects, and Vivid Projects, has been reviewed in publications as This Is Tomorrow and Curado.

 

Tomilola is the founder of Èfùnsíkú, an African-centred creative infrastructure she is developing to support African and diaspora creatives, grounded in a simple belief that creatives thrive when they have space, resources and community around them.