Pelumi Oluyemi often turns everyday experiences into metaphors for bigger social issues. She uses familiar places to explore themes like work, ambition, and daily routines.

FIGURATIVE painting has always been a way to tell stories from daily life. The real challenge is making familiar subjects feel fresh. Oluwapelumi Oluyemi does this by using repeated symbols, layered meanings, and a focus on the routines of commuting in her portraits.

Oluyemi uses a limited but distinct set of colors, shapes, and compositions, giving her work a unique style. Her portraits draw viewers in and encourage a closer look. Sometimes, the paintings in a series look so similar that it becomes hard to tell them apart, which raises questions about how she uses repetition as both a theme and a technique.

Her paintings often turn everyday moments into symbols for larger social issues. She uses familiar scenes to explore work, ambition, and routine, adding small details that invite viewers to look longer. Instead of telling simple stories, her art reveals its meaning slowly to those who pay attention.

In ‘The Unending Cycle’, Oluyemi uses the daily commute as a symbol for the rat race. The painting, set inside a train, looks at how constant movement often leads nowhere new. Here, the routine becomes more important than the destination, showing how repetition can feel like progress even when nothing really changes.

Now living in the UK, Oluyemi uses her experience with public transport to tell a story that goes beyond one person’s journey. Her painting reflects a common situation in many cities, where long commutes, financial stress, and the search for better opportunities shape daily life. She often adds painted words to her work, grounding these stories and giving hints about place and viewpoint.

READ ALSO: Who should pay for a date between a man and a woman?

The phrase ‘Same Route Different Day’ is more than just a label. It sets the pace of the painting and highlights the idea of endless repetition. Inside the seat patterns, a running figure appears repeatedly in colours inspired by public transport. This loop only becomes clear after a while, much like how daily routines can go unnoticed until they shape our lives.

The painting becomes more emotional by including family photos hidden under the paint. These faded images hint at the relationships, duties, and dreams that travel with each commuter, even if we can’t see them. Their presence moves the focus from just commuting to the personal reasons behind it. Instead of praising movement, ‘The Unending Cycle’ asks if always being on the move really leads to progress, or if the idea of reaching a goal is just an illusion.

Oluyemi explores these ideas further in ‘Train Aunty’, another piece from her ‘Rat Race Series’. Here, the train again stands for systems where people are always moving but not always getting ahead. The main figure is easy to recognize, but the painting uses her story to think about work, endurance, and hope.

The title refers to Bemi Orojuogun, known online as Bus Aunty, who became popular for her videos about daily commuting. Oluyemi moves the scene from a bus to a train, but the painting isn’t just about one person. Instead, the commuter stands for many people who move through systems that promise opportunity but often repeat the same routines.

‘The Unending Cycle’ and ‘Train Aunty’ are closely connected. They share themes, artistic techniques, and symbols. If Oluyemi meant for them to look so similar, it supports the main idea of the ‘Rat Race Series’—that repetition is central. However, this approach can also be criticized, since the paintings sometimes look so alike that they lose their unique character.

In ‘Train Aunty’, a painted phrase makes the artist’s point clear: “They call it opportunity, yet it’s just a loop disguised as a ladder.” This line challenges how we talk about ambition and moving up in society, suggesting that what looks like progress might just be another cycle of work and repetition. It’s one of the clearest statements of the series’ main idea.

The same visual style from ‘The Unending Cycle’ appears again. A running figure, shown repeatedly in metro-inspired seat patterns, forms another loop that you only notice if you look closely. This mirrors how routines can become part of life before we even realize it.

Family photos, hidden under the paint, show up again and add more emotion to the work. Their partial hiding suggests that commuters carry their families, duties, and dreams with them, even if we don’t see it. These small details keep the paintings from being just about public transport. Instead, they invite us to think about modern working life and whether constant movement really leads to change, or if the cycle is the end point itself.