Susanne Wenger
Susanne Wenger MFR, also known as Adunni Olorisha (4 July 1915 – 12 January 2009), was an Austrian-Nigerian artist and Yoruba priestess who expatriated to Nigeria. Her main focus was the Yoruba culture and she was successful in building an artist cooperative in Osogbo. She partnered with local artists in Osogbo to redevelop and redecorate the Osun Osogbo Sacred Grove with sculptures and carvings depicting the various activities of the Orishas.
Wenger was a leading advocate for the preservation of the Osun Grove. Due to her efforts, the grove was made a national monument in 1965, and was later marked as a world heritage site.
Quotes
[edit]- "It doesn't matter what you call it. It is a sacred force that represents the experience of life that informs human beingness.
- Obituary, theguardian.com, 26 March 2009; accessed 21 March 2025.
- “serve life in a life-enhancing way”
- The veil of taboo and language scepticism lays itself over the works that are free from materialism and empty transcendence.
- "Susanne Wenger - "Art is Ritual". Susanne Wenger Foundation. 27 February 2014. Retrieved 21 March 2025.
- "Creative thinking and art are not measurable since they're testimony of the truth and inherent in all that exists. And this truth, the only truth, has many faces. Who can count the faces of truth? All religion are ultimately the religion of mankind. Art is ritual."
- "And as with all religions, there is no true way to explain it along rational lines without leeching it of its meaning and intensely personal quality. You are a part of it and it is a part of you. You may, as so many have done, push it aside, but it remains in you…in all of us."
- Oreva, Duke. "Susanne Wenger: A brief walk in to the life of Adunni Olorisa". Retrieved 21 March 2025.
Quotes about her
[edit]- ‘Diane Esguerra is a very fine writer’
- ‘There’s something incredibly effortless and beautiful about the way Esguerra writes’
- ‘If Diane’s purpose was the intrigue and open the reader’s mind to Oshun, then she’s done a spectacular job as I’m now hungry for more learning on the subject’
- "The Oshun Diaries by Diane Esguerra | Eye Books".
