An expressive sculptor whose anthropomorphic vessels probe the psychological and material depths of human feeling.
Woody De Othello is a multidisciplinary artist working in sculpture, painting and drawing. Known for his glazed ceramics and bronzes that interrogate the genre of “still life,” Othello creates animistic vessels based on domestic objects. The artist’s deep engagement with clay and its connection to homelands is integral to his practice. From the nkisi of Central Africa to the Indigenous Dagara cosmology of sub-Saharan Africa, Othello embraces the regenerative power of the material.
Othello (b. 1991, Miami, FL) holds an MFA from the California College of Arts, San Francisco and BFA from Florida Atlantic University. His first solo museum exhibition, presented by Pérez Art Museum Miami , will travel to the Manetti Shrem Museum of Art in fall 2026. Othello’s work was included in the 2022 Whitney Biennial and has exhibited widely in group exhibitions at SFMOMA, San Francisco; Hayward Gallery, London; The Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York; and Smithsonian American Art Museum and Renwick Gallery, Washington D.C., among others. Othello has enjoyed large-scale public art commissions at San Francisco International Airport, de Young Museum, Brooklyn Bridge Park (organized by Public Art Fund), and John F. Kennedy Airport, which is slated to open in 2026. His work is in the permanent collections of the Hirshhorn Museum and Sculpture Garden, Washington D.C.; Whitney Museum of American Art; PAMM; SFMOMA; de Young Museum, San Francisco; Seattle Art Museum; LACMA, Los Angeles; Museum of Fine Arts, Boston; Carnegie Museum of Art, Pittsburgh; Aishti Foundation, Beirut; MAXXI National Museum of 21st Century Art, Rome, Italy, and many more. Othello lives and works in Oakland, CA.
