In Conversation: Sharon Walter & Pejú Oshin : National Portrait Gallery

Sharon Walters was In Conversation with curator Péjú Oshin at the National Portrait Gallery, to celebrate the Gallery’s acquisition of her portrait of community campaigners, Eric and Jessica Elleisse Huntley (née Carroll).

Walters and Oshin discussed the portrait and how it was developed for the National Portrait Gallery’s Citizen UK project, considering how the work thematically links to her wider work, style and influences. The portrait was commissioned by the National Portrait Gallery as part of Citizen UK. Citizen UK is a collaborative project working with Tower Hamlets Local History Library & Archives; the Ealing Local History Centre Archives; the Museum of Croydon and Wolverhampton Arts & Culture to explore post Second World War migration and British citizenship in these areas. Citizen Researchers from Ealing looked at archival material and stories from across the borough – two of the people who particularly inspired the group and had a significant impact on Ealing and beyond were Eric and Jessica Huntley.

Biographies: 

Sharon Walters is a London-based artist and project curator. Her multidisciplinary series Seeing Ourselves, explores identity, beauty standards, and race through intricate paper cut-outs, hand-assembled collages, podcasts, talks, and events. In her layered collages, Walters creates dimensional and complex depictions of Black women. Floated in glass, her paper-cuts cast shadows of themselves, alluding to a past within. Her practice confronts exclusionary and othering narratives perpetuated against Black communities, emphasising their right to 'take up space'.

Péjú Oshin is a British-Nigerian curator, writer, and lecturer. As Associate Director at Gagosian, she curated the exhibition Rites of Passage. Her previous roles include Curator at Tate, where she focused on Young People's Programmes and delivered large-scale events like Late at Tate Britain and public art projects like Beyond Boundaries. She is the author of Between Words & Space and has written for artists and publications including the Financial Times HTSI. Her work spans curatorial and education projects with Wellcome Collection, Barbican, Universal Music Group, Byredo, and NTS Radio.