Sunday 24 July 2016

For 'Benefit/Collector', artists converge at Gallery Delta


Gallery Delta, Livingstone Avenue, Greenwood Park, Harare, shows Benefit/Collectors exhibition, featuring paintings, graphics, ceramics and sculptures.   
 
One of the paintings showing at Gallery, Delta.
With previewing from noon, to be opened by artist, Cosmas Shiridzinomwa on July, 26, 2016 at 5.30.p.m, the exhibition runs till end of August.

The show include works by Arthur Azevedo, Simon Back, Berry Bickle, Tafadzwa Gwetai, Masimba Hwati, 
Richard Jack, Rashid Jogee,   Lovemore Kambudzi, 
Admire Kamudzengerere, Helen Lieros, Shepherd Mahufe, Wallen Mapondera, Misheck Masamvu, Munyaradzai Mazarire,  Luis Meque (1966-1998) and Clive Mukucha. Other artists showing include Munyaradzi Mugorosa, Daryl Nero, Victor Nyakauru, Thakor Patel, Kate Raath, Gregory Shaw, 
Cosmas Shiridzinomwa, Freddy Tauro,  Paul Wade, Marjorie Wallace, Richard Witikani,  Johnson Zuze and Portia Zvavahera. Also featuring is a select collection of Swiss graphics.
  

Defining Visitors Through Lines, Shades Of Uzor

By Tajudeen Sowole
As conflict between societal demands is contentious against individuals' right to independent expression, there seems to be systemic submerge, which makes people feel like aliens within their cultural space, so suggests monochrome, but painterly ink works of Austin Uzor.
 
Untitled, ink on paper by Austin Uzor
 On display in a conventional white wall space, till July 30, 2016, at Rele Gallery, Onikan, Ikoyi, Lagos, Uzor's work, aside the thematic context, challenges the widely accepted aesthetics and curatorial regiment of white or bright walls used by most galleries.  Against the white walls, the artist's styles and techniques in ink wriggle through the combined intensity of the spotlights and emission of the walls.

 Mostly in ladies portraits, depicting fashion and beauty, the unidentified figures expose how individual, either slips into the hole of societal confinement or get caged in self-expression while trying to escape from communal regimentation. And quite of interest, Uzor attempts some surreal, perhaps to expand the argument about norms and the other side of it.

 With portraits such as Pool Of Thoughts, Adorable Allergies, War Head, Dusty Clouds, Whispers Of Destruction, Anticipants and Untitled, Uzor places emphasis on the head as the central point from which the energy that initiates any change is generated. Yes, the portraits could pass as illustrations for beauty products or services, but the intellectual depth in articulating the argument about individual versus societal norms is also loud in the ebullient of the images.

 Further taking the subject into the realm of metaphysics are few of the works in surreal-like such as Patches Of Light, Food Is Ready, Mud Fences and Ashes and Rain. 
  
 Uzor notes that everyone, biologically, was "born free until society created a system and made us live strictly by its standards." And when he argues that for survival sake "we traded our values and in so doing have allowed shackles built by society on our wrists," one wonders what values an individual has pre-birth. Values - religious, cultural or professional - are naturally integral parts of man's extension as members of the society.

 The catalogue of Visitors, interestingly, carries endorsement of Legacy Empire Management (LEM) a new art promotion group. Recall that LEM, made its debut in art exhibition with Olawunmi Banjo's solo Mind Revolution at Nike Gallery, Lekki in 2014.
 For Uzor, Visitors appears like a good start in deep thematic context for an artist coming freshly into the Lagos art space. Excerpts from his artist statement: "In this transformation we find ourselves walking around in pain and intermittently in unprecedented joy and controlled laughter as Fela aptly called it, ‘suffering and smiling.’

He insists that the norms keep getting stronger because society provides the umbrella for ailing conscience. “Our minds are therefore bound by beliefs which are formed of dust and so our true nature is forgotten as we have transcendentally become visitors in our own land. 

 “Our true selves are non- existent and our conscience wanders away and fades off at the dawn of realities like the morning mist that just got ambushed by the rising sun. Society is the new landlord and we are only but loyal tenants at his mercy. This analysis has taken a visual and illustrative dimension as every aspect of our everyday lives has been narrowed down to figurative expressions with Ballpoint pen drawings body of work by me."

'Mangbetu'...Struggle Against Modernisation


In what London, U.K-based October Gallery describes as Eddy Kamuanga Ilungas current series themed Mangbetu, the Congolese artist explores struggle of the Mangbetu people, an ethnic group of warrior extraction in the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC), whose culture, like most African countries, is facing modernisation challenges.
 
From Eddy Kamuanga Ilunga's Manghetu
Currently ongoing, the show which is the artists first at the gallery and debut solo in the U.K, specifically references modern industry and the traditional culture of the Mangbetu, bringing their vibrant fabrics, symbolic objects and daily rituals into confrontation with the digital imagery of modern day. The gallery views his paintings as possessing a monumental quality that is both heroic and elegiac, with a striking and sophisticated interplay of intensity and emptiness, two and three dimensions, and Congolese pattern painted as European drapery.

 The DRC is the worlds largest exporter of coltan, a raw material used in computer chips and mobile phones. 

  October Gallery notes that Ilunga is one of the most exciting young artists working in Africa today. Born in the Democratic Republic of Congo in 1991, he trained at the Kinshasa Academy of Arts and has founded the dynamic Congolese art collective MPongo, representative of the creative vibrancy to be found in modern Kinshasa.

 Ilungas work has been exhibited across Africa, notably at DakArt; Biennale OFF Senegal in 2014, and made its London debut at the Saatchi Gallerys Panagaea II in 2015. The enormous excitement around the 24-year-old artist at Londons 1:54 Contemporary African Art Fair in 2015 and at New Yorks Armory Show in 2016 was compounded by an article in the FTs How to Spend It, which employed his work Lost to represent The Best of New York Armory 2016.

Born in 1991, Kinshasa, Democratic Republic of Congo. Lives and works in Kinshasa, Democratic Republic of Congo Eddy Kamuanga Ilunga graduated from the Institute of Fine Art, Kinshasa in 2009. He then joined the Academy of Fine Arts, Kinshasa but soon sought emancipation from the Academy in establishing the studio "M'Pongo", a collective of young artists in Kinshasa looking for a creative and individual style.  At the same time he took part in several exhibitions in the DRC and abroad, including an exhibition at the French Institute Gallery, Brazzaville, Congo, and Dak'Art OFF, Dak'Art: The Biennale of Contemporary African Art, Senegal, 2014.

Kamuanga draws from the structural complexity of his hometown and revisits the traditional culture of the Mangbetu people. Referencing different forms of advertising and photography as well as traditional aesthetics, his paintings are an amalgam of complementary pop cultural forms, including music, fashion and dance. They offer an intelligent approach to popular culture by exposing the anxieties and joys of his contemporaries. He has exhibited most recently at Saatchi Gallery, London as part of Pangaea II.


Saturday 23 July 2016

London Design Biennale Debuts With Nigerian Pavilion, Others


 Nigerian Pavilion goes to London Design Biennale, an event making its first edition, celebrating design and engineering, from September 7-27, 2016. 
 
According to the curator of the Nigerian Pavilion, Gozi Ochonogor, Nigeria will be one of 30 countries showing designs at Somerset House.
 
Ulo, a Nigerian Pavilion for 
London Design Biennale
“The Biennale presents an extraordinary opportunity for countries and representative cities to create design statements that address the 2016 theme, ‘Utopia by Design’,” Ochonogor stated. “The Nigerian team are addressing issues faced by river based communities - oil spills, gas flares which causes health issues such as cancer, and flooding.”

 The Nigerian presentation at the biennale is described as an installation titled Ulo, made from traditional building materials and processed water hyacinth. It is raised on stilts, elevated above an oil trough suggesting a Utopian future where oil is perceived in alternate ramifications. 

Ochonogor listed other exhibits to include lamps, an interactive light installation about gas flares that engages social media, and a survival raincoat designed to deal with flash floods.

Tuesday 19 July 2016

'Bury Me Come Sunday Afternoon' Arrives Lagos

Nike Campbell-Fatoki
A collection of short stories titled Bury Me Come Sunday Afternoon, by Nigerian-American author Nike Campbell-Fatoki will be released July 2016 in Lagos, Nigeria.
 

In this short story collection, Campbell-Fatoki filters the lives of contemporary Nigerians through a colourful and vivid prism, where past sins come to upset settled lives, where lost lives fuel a campaign for a better future and nothing is as it seems.  She explores well-known themes but delves a little deeper, questioning our ideas about people, our impressions and prejudices. 

Bury Me Come Sunday Afternoon depicts the struggles of a young ambitious and hardworking Nigerian abroad with the same insightful candour as it does the tale of a brilliant but broken woman struggling with mental illness.
The collection of short stories has received good reviews from major local and international quarters. Attached is a selection of media reviews:
“Bury Me Come Sunday Afternoon elevates her as a masterful storyteller. Each of the stories is eloquently crafted without the condescension to readers that comes with a ribbon-wrapped ending. By turns amusing, sad and painful, each of the stories in this collection moved me to some deep emotion, and they will do the same for you too whether reading about religion, mental illness, gender roles or open marriages. Another wonderful and unapologetic addition to the growing genre of literature by writers from Africa.” --Zukiswa Wanner, Men of the South, shortlisted, Commonwealth Writers' Prize.

“These are stories worth telling from a writer worth reading” --E.C. Osondu, winner, The Caine Prize for Africa.

"Campbell-Fatoki's characters share their stories of loss, love and reclaimed identity in a way that leaves you wanting for more.” --Yejide Kilanko, author of Daughters Who Walk This Path.

Nike’s language is precise and direct.  Her characters are sharply observant and self-aware even as they battle odds that stack against them.  Morals are explored but there is no judgment even when the characters take vengeful and extreme actions.  Heroes are created in unlikely scenarios and life as we know it, with more than one surprising twist unfolds in the pages.

Nikẹ Campbell-Fatoki was born in Lvov, Ukraine and grew up in Lagos, Nigeria. She is the author of the historical fiction novel, Thread of Gold Beads, published in 2012 and adapted to a stage play in 2014.  The novel was translated into French and published by Worldreader in 2015.

Nikẹ was a guest author at the Ake Arts and Book Festival in 2014, the largest book festival in Africa.  Her short story, The Appointment, has been published in Brittle Paper, an online literary magazine. Her poem, Rapture, has also been published in the Ake Review. 
Nikẹ lives in the Washington DC area with her family where she is presently writing her next historical fiction novel.
 

Quramo Publishing is an independent publishing company committed to producing the highest quality content for various audiences. The company’s portfolio includes the following imprints: Q Books, mango Books, The Kuramo Report, and CLRN Direct, with more imprints to come. Quramo’s goal is to publish a range of titles from cultural history to contemporary fiction and non-fiction as well as academic and specialized work.  Works that preserve the stories of significant events and distil the spirit of their time.

Sunday 17 July 2016

Coming to China...Over Two Thousand Years Heritage Berthed In Lagos


By Tajudeen Sowole
 What has been described as inter-cultural dialogue between nations was experienced in Lagos, few days ago when a world heritage site in China was re-enacted via art exhibition in Lagos. Captured by a Nigerian artist, Uzoma Samuel Anyanwu, the Chinese cultural sites of Emperor Qin Shi Huang's mausoleum and the Terracotta Army Museum exhibition of photography, collage painting and sculpture further confirmed the ongoing relationship between Nigeria and the East's leading power house. 
 
Bronze Chariots from Imperial Fleets exhibited in photography at ‘Coming To China’… in Lagos



Inside the showroom of a Chinese product, GAC Motors, Victoria Island, Lagos, the exhibition titled, Coming To China, included Anyanwu's travelogue, which captures Confucian culture in a mix of ancient and contemporary architectures as well as the Great Wall of China. Also on display were the artist's portraiture of the great Mao Zeadong and pictures of some Chinese artefacts.
 

  Organised as a dedicated curatorial project under Prince Yemisi Shyllon Chair for Fine Art and Design, University of Port Harcourt, Rivers State, the exhibition, basically, celebrates one of the crucial periods of China: era of Emperor Huang (259-2010 BC).

    
For Chinese world heritage sites, listed by UNESCO in 1987, copies of Qin terracotta sculptures and perhaps the photography works were on display in Africa for the first time, the organisers disclosed. But in a contemporary age that exposes cultures to the fragility of extinction, a major question might agitate the minds of keen observers: what exactly would Nigeria gain from promoting the heritage of another country? The donor of the professorial chair, Omooba Yemisi Shyllon, who spoke during the opening of the exhibition stated that there is a commonality between Nigeria and China from which each country has a lot to gain in cultural exchange. Noting that before western civilisation, the Chinese people had their own, Shyllon argued that "Chinese and Nigerians, particularly, people of southwest" of the host country "have a lot in common in heritage education to share." Commending GAC Motors for giving space to showcase the works, Shyllon hoped that "exhibition like this will get the two countries closer."


   Expanding the gains of the exhibition, Prof Frank Ugiomoh, Chair Occupant at Omooba Yemisi Shyllon Chair for Fine Art and Design, University of Port Harcourt explained to guests, at the opening, the importance of Nigeria benefiting from the ongoing global cultural interactions. "The exhibition is aimed at getting into the inter cultural dialogue across the world." He described the exhibition as part of "cultural advancement." Specifically, Ugiomoh, a Prof Art History stressed that Nigeria has a lot to learn from China in the area of "documenting the past" to enhance future development of the country.


 The presence of China in Nigeria goes beyond material or business gains, so suggest the exhibition as well as other activities of the Asians, particularly in the area of education. This much, Wang Yongjing, Director at Confucius Institute, University of Lagos (UNILAG), explained during her speech at the opening of Coming To China. "It's good to have the two culture interact," Yongjing stated.


 Between 2014 and 2015, Anyanwu was in China, and curiously had a "mission to explore Chinese culture." Anyanwu disclosed that the exhibition was part of his dream realised, particularly in the area of managing cultural heritage. "Promoting Chinese art is satisfying a dream in learning from China, the process of heritage management."

  
 From his 'Project Statement', published in the brochure of the exhibition, Ugiomoh further contextualised his argument about inter-cultural dialogue. "The experience of other cultures in their works of arts offer valuable insight into what can be learnt," Ugiomoh stated. He cited, for example, late Nigerian archaeologist, Ekpo Eyo's historic exhibition titled 2000 Years of Nigerian Art, held in London, U.K, and noted how the event showcased to the world, the country's ancient heritage. "The documentation, largely a collection of the arts of royal conventions places Nigeria among nations with world class heritage sites of UNESCO ranking."

  On the objectives of Omooba Yemisi Shyllon Chair for Fine Art and Design, Ugiomoh added that one of such is "to foster enlightenment concerning art."


 The Omooba Yemisi Shyllon Professorial Chair in Visual Arts dates back to 2012, when the donor made the endowment at the University of Port Harcourt. Shyllon has  also founded global on-line journal of African Art- The OYASAF Journal of Art (TOJA).

How Asidere Expands Protest Art With Mental Space



By Tajudeen Sowole

 IN highlighting art's potency as a pivotal importance of human development, Duke Asidere excavates basics of painting and drawing, perhaps, more extensively, than he has not done in a single exhibition. He also uses the opportunity of his expansive expression to, again, spotlight a decayed socio-political terrain of Nigeria.

 
Duke Asidere
As an artist, Asidere's radical view on art is well known to followers of his art, just as the artist is not a fresher in protest art. These two factors form the crust of his current art exhibition titled Mental Space, currently showing at The Wheatbaker, Ikoyi, Lagos.

 Coming about two months after his solo, Mood Colour Harmony, shown in Paris, France, Mental Space stresses how Asidere, in recent times has been exposing certain level of prolificity. And to keep releasing some of his ebullient themes, a wider window comes in Mental Space, as the exhibits are divided into series.  Such series include Faces, portraits in diversity of expressions; Signature Forms, set of paintings, mostly from his seated figure themes; Sketches, drawings on papers of mostly ladies figures, that stress the artist's spontaneity character; and Power, his visual narratives of Nigeria's erratic electricity supply.


 Two headless figures matted on brownish newsprint, with a full figure in the background titled Preservation describes the artist's preference for traditional way of reading newspapers, even in the growing age of digital medium.  And whenever he chose digital or electronics generally, "distortions" he notes always took over the airwaves. Representing his thoughts on how radio, TV and social media airwaves have damaged people's sense of value and facts is a lone figure, Distortion Facts and Historical Lies. For examples, common expressions such as 'Muslim north', 'Lagos press', in Asidere's views are "distortions" that distract Nigerians from the real issues of under development. "These are not the real issues," he tells select guests during  preview.


  Still on distortion, his immediate environment, Lagos, currently, he argues, has not added to the sanity that existed in the state few years ago.  But Lagos, under the current administration 'is working' at least from media perspective. "Lagos is back to the days of risk," Asidere insists. "Okadas are back everywhere in the state from IDPs in the north, and traffic lawlessness on the increase, particularly in breaking of lights."


 Another piece, Living In the Past extends the issue of distortion by exposing how previous prejudices of story tellers had damaged young generations' perception of people that are not of the same faiths or ethnic groups.
 
From Power Series of Duke Asidere at Mental Space



  An advocate of relevant art, Asidere maintains his position that "it's not enough for us to sell art, but we must use art to engage issues." As much as people's right diversity of political views cannot be denied in a complex setting such as Nigeria's, the posture of some individuals - artists inclusive - appear to have sympathy for those who want Nigeria to remain chained in the past. 

"Worrisome," he agrees. "These artists have the right to their views. But sometimes, I ask them: why do you think like this in 21 st century?" He argues that a collective efforts is needed to ensure peaceful environment for progress, warning that "we must deal with criminals, and not throw money at militants."


  Based in Egbeda, a suburb of metropolitan Lagos, Asidere keeps dragging his neighborhood, particularly Orelope Street, into his art. Several outdoor workshops organised by his Play Spot Studio in recent years had engaged the neighbourhood. For Mental Space, the attraction are women traders who operate shops along the street.

 Having tracked the consistency of the women over the decades, Asidere brings Orelope into his current exhibition to spotlight how women are supporting families' earnings across Nigeria.


  Curated by Sandra Mbanefo Obiago, sponsored by the Wheatbaker and Louis Guntrum Wines, Mental Space, according to the curator "explores the human form through detailed drawings which touch on universal themes of love and greed, war and peace, trade and silent meditation, play and serious discourse."


  Obiago notes that Asidere's drawings "challenge us to reflect on a constantly changing political context, in which he highlights the crazy and controversial excesses in our lives with bold, often humorous poignancy.”


Between Asidere, Obiago and Wheatbaker, there is a camaraderie that works. Asidere's work was among the first set of pieces that opened what has become a new face in hospitality when the hotel started business in 2011.

Brushing Motion With Energy Of Oyedemi


By Tajudeen Sowole
An artist's brush strokes that are always on motion, like animated-images from 24 seconds per frame film velocity, exists in John Oyedemi's canvas. The artist's ability in creating illusion of motion and crowd effect on canvas find strong inspiration in disorganised cosmopolitan cities where movement is as constant as day and night.

Dynamic Horsemen (2016, 97x130 cm on canvas

And with equestrian subjects from elsewhere that are almost bursting out of the canvas, Oyedemi keeps viewers of his works mentally on motion.


 Along a lobby at The Moorehoise Hotel, Ikoyi, Lagos where the paintings were on display during a cloudy evening, as a body of work titled Energy, visitors to the exhibition would do with some motions, mentally, to generate a bit of warm feeling. Either the captures on canvas are from the elitist polo game or cultural Durban displays, Oyedemi applies his palette in complementing the elegance of horses in actions.

  
For whatever reason, most of his paintings are deodorised with fog, a style that weave some kind of mystery around the figures and sceneries. Artists deploying mist or fogs to garnish their canvas is comon, particularly to create depth. But in Oydemi's paintings, his application of colours still glow under the high intensity of the lights and shades.


 Oyedemi is based in Jos, Plateau State, a relatively calm and less chaotic urban. How did his canvas emit so much motion, synonymous with chaotic urban? "I lived in Lagos, specifically Oshodi, for a long time before moving to Jos," the artist disclosed to a guest. 


 In Jos, the crowd mentality continued, when he "hawked in the market" as an extension of survival instinct. So, painting market scene, for Oyedemi, is releasing part of his life experience and not like falling into the battered repetitive theme path that most Nigerian artists have walked. "The market nostalgia still haunts me, even till now."

  Over a decade after moving out of Lagos, the motion and energy mentality remained, particularly when he had been "visiting Lagos since 1990s." Among the market scenes in Energy is Igi Nla In The Market (2015), a common site where huge trees are found in regular large gatherings. And quite of note, some of the trees, particularly in the rural areas, have spiritual attachment, so certain sections of the dwellers believe.
 

 Also, Oyedemi's view of Oshodi as it used to be in the pre-Babatunde Raji Fashola era formed parts of the exhibits. It's on record that the former Governor of Lagos State, Fashola, who built on the efforts of his predecessor, Sen Bola Ahmed Tinubu, was moving the state towards a new direction of sanity.  

 Whoever likes to take a visual analysis of the current state of the environment of Lagos has Oyedemi's Lagos Series as a window. From Lagos Rendevous (2016), a chaotic mix of street traders and molue buses, to Lagos I and II, also same year and similar mix of activities, there seems to be a resurgence of molue buses. The paintings, according to Oyedemi - a PhD holder in studio practice from Ahmadu Bello University (ABU), Zaria - were done "while preparing for this exhibition," hence the currency of capture periods. Indeed, a drive through some spots, particularly in parts of Oshodi and Iyana Ipaja always suggest that insanity days of disorganised environment are returning to parts of Lagos.

 All of a sudden, artists, particularly from the academia, have, in recent years, stepping beyond Master as terminal degree in Fine Arts. For Oyedemi, his Energy exhibition consolidates his PhD status. "I am the first to have a solo exhibition among my set of PhD holders in studio at ABU," he enthused. Specifically, he disclosed that the effect of black on other colours was among his key focuses for the PhD programme.

 Oyedemi is a lecturer at University of Jos, Plateau state.


How Ogakwu, Onobrakpeya stretched Beyond Limitations

By Tajudeen Sowole
 One year after Chinedu Ogakwu made his debut entry onto the Lagos art landscape, the Port Harcourt-based artist has found collaboration with a colleague, John Urherigho Onobrakpeya. Together, the two artists, last week, displayed the diversity in creative enterprise of the canvas.
 
Revolution by Chinedu Ogakwu
While Onobrakpeya brought onto the joint space, a subtle rendition in mostly abstract impressionism, Ogakwu extended his textured canvas technique as the collaboration produced Beyond Limitation, shown  at Terra Kulture, Victoria Island, Lagos. With works that blend modernist and contemporary contents, the artists are, perhaps, suggesting that art terms that draw a line between periods are merely active as vocabularies, and such expressions should not confine an artist.


With a painting he titles Creation, Onobrakpeya takes viewers through celestial realm by applying his palette of impressionism to peep into the world that, perhaps, existed when there was nothing. Whatever relativity that his concept of Creation suggests, the aesthetics of the painting is in separating of the canvas into two, generating shades and hues of colours. In such quality, perhaps lies the value of the beauty that exists in the painting.


  Remember the scene in Michael Jackson's rock-like Dirty Diana video track from the late legend's 'Bad' album? Yes, that's what Onobrakpeya's Black Model, a silhouette rendition of back-lit female figures, which appears like a lift from Jackson's video. For those whose definition of woman virtue is celebrating 'figure 8', Onobrakpeya's Black Model is yours to savour.


Increasingly, contemporaneity is collapsing traditional lines between genres nd medium, so suggests relief piece on canvas technique of Ogakwu. From his Illimite solo exhibition, last year, held at the same gallery, the artist continues to dazzle Lagos art scene, expanding his cracked texture technique in the joint show.

   
For Beyond Limitation,  one of the works titled Illusion, a gathering of wobbled faces in mask styles take one's memory back to ancient art. And as nude male figures has become common themes for the artist, he brings them in diverse moods.


In one of the cracked canvas pieces titled Revolution, Ogakwu goes mystic in the composite of a nude man lying on his back on a what looks like the globe. Adding to the spiritual texture of the scene is a ray of light from an anonymous source.


  "My work consists of using bark of wood to create the basis of the pieces," Ogakwu explained in his artist's statement. "It's like a trance thus allows me to bring diverse sources from my background, culture and life experiences. By transforming the bark of wood in my work, they are given new relevancy."


Excerpts from Onobrakpeya's bio: He has exhibited extensively and received so many Awards in Nigeria and Abroad. His works can be found in Galleries, Hotels, Homes and Offices in Nigeria and Abroad. He is known for creative Water fountain and swimming pools. He is into Landscaping. 


Excerpts from Ogakwu's bio;  Illimit, solo exhibition at Terra Kulture, 2015; A Step Forward, LandMark Hotel Port Harcourt 2014; Contemporary Art . Bricklane Gallery, London 2014; Music of Colours, Total Village Port Harcourt .2012; and Dak'Art Biennale, Dakar, Senegal! 2010, 2012 and 2014.

Sunday 10 July 2016

Transitions With jegede's Palette Of Probity


By Tajudeen Sowole
 Art historian, Prof dele jegede, who was a celebrated cartoonist at Daily Times, attempts a probity of how his work has affected cross sections of people whose lives have been intruded, by his palette, within the context of his home country's developmental challenges.
   
Internally Displaced Police (Rofo-Rofo Fight) Acrylic on canvas 76.2cm x 101.6cm 2015


Based in Ohio, U.S., jegede, who is currently on a visit to Lagos goes on the canvas for visual accounts of his thoughts via a solo art exhibition titled Transitions, showing from July 14-23, 2016 at Terra Kulture, Victoria Island, Lagos. The exhibition is coming within six years of his last show, Peregrinations in Nigeria.
  Between his period of being a cartoonist/painter and adding career in academia, quite a lot has transited - for him personally and for the nation - making the artist's second solo in a tumultuous and longest democratic era of his country worth appropriating in visual narratives.

  As a professional whose career in the creative circuit has been largely within the academic environment, the activism texture of his palette hardly changes, from his media period, so suggest some of his paintings in Transitions, viewed via e-copies. More interesting, the renditions, which come with blossomed colours are complemented with equal diversity of trending words, sometimes garnished with the artist's coinages.

  As much as it could be conveniently argued that quite a success has been recorded, by government, in the past one year against the religious lunacy known as Boko Haram, it would take vegetation of human memory to erase some of the key words that emerged from the nearly nine years of destruction in north east of Nigeria. Such, as depicted by jegede, in diverse creative tones include IDP, #BBOG, Sambisa Forest. Chibok, among other dark memories of the insurgency. 

  In a conceptual armed figure titled. BH-Sambisa Forest, painted in acrylic on canvas (2016), comes a body of armed terrorist implanted with a tree as head,  adding sci-fi touch to the concept. But the deadly terrain is not missing as depicted in the scull beneath the forest of head. A jegede composite of Boko Haram-capture such as this is scary, suggesting that beneath the surface of the vast Sambisa forest - said to be as wide as four states put together - is the real battle ahead in rescuing the abducted Chibok girls. 
BH (Boko Haram) 3 by Prof dele jegede

From the government's battle against Boko Haram, descriptions such as Internally Displaced Persons (IDPs) and Improvised Explosive Device (IEDs) suddenly became louder in the  Nigerian security vocabulary. But jegede, whose canvas highlight victims of the insurgency also reminds us that IDPs come in diverse forms beyond the real definition. A miserable-looking man, dressed in class attire of VIP in one of the works, and adults in fisticuffs in another painting, which jegede places under his coinage Internally Displaced Politicians series broaden the meaning of IDPs. Satirical as the artist's concept is, the salient aspect of the highlights is the tragic consequences of the Nigerian politicians whose systemic looting artistry has financially bled the nation to comatose.
  Displacement, according to jegede, also extends to the nation's security professionals whose compromised values have, in recent years, provided fuel for the wild fire of impunity across the country. Like bulls in head-to-head battle, two policemen, in jegede's Internally Displaced Police (Rofo-Rofo Fight), represent a disorgnised security sector.

  And for those whose DNA is formed with perpetual denial of the missing Chibok girls, jegede's paintings such as Chibok-Agony of A Mother, BH (#BBOG), IDP Aisha and BBOG Sheer Anguish, among similar BH-related titles could serve as piercing truth meant to haunt the conscience of heartless tribal jingoists and their bigots cousins. It is disheartening that over 800 days after the girls were declared missing, and with overwhelming evidences of abduction, most people from certain sections of Nigeria are still dwelling in denial, perhaps, as an extension of their ethno-religious partisan behaviour.

  However, history tellers - across genres and medium of creative disciplines - are not infallible, particularly where sentiment comes as a natural extension of emotion. For example, one questions the message, which Prof jegede attempts to pass across with a seemingly divisive painting titled BH (Boko Haram) 3. Capture of an agonising woman against devastating and destructive explosions, ordinarily, would not raise any question; such scene is a common 'trademark' of the BH satanic group. But when the artist conspicuously places a cross - symbol of Christianity - in the hand of the woman, the contents of the painting becomes suspiciously divisive. It's on record that the Boko Haram terrorists, from 2009 when the insurgency started, have not been selective along religious lines in their targets. While it makes no meaning trying to go into numerical contest of which faith suffered more, records have it that, more innocent Muslims have been felled by bombs and bullets of the terrorists, than people of any other faiths. The Boko Haram insurgency has been an attack on all peace-loving peoples across faiths.

  Perhaps avoiding an art exhibition walls full of only bloodletting stories from north east of Nigeria, Prof jegede brings a balance in other pieces known as Celestial Aesthetics Series. These sets of paintings could take viewers into the realm of spiritual galaxy; another world created from the imaginative strength of an artist.  The Celestial Series, he discloses, are spiritual reminders of his deceased son, Ayo.

  Whoever has not exactly dissected the direction of jegede's art or missed something, in the artist's over four decades practice, here comes another window in his Transitions exhibition. "As an art historian, my work attempts to disrupt the canonical imbalance in the historicization of texts by privileging the Black perspective," jegede writes in his Artist Statement. "Our own lions must have their own historians lest the hunter write the story of the hunt,” he argues, recalling that “as a cartoonist, I drench acerbic issues in palatable coats of humor for public consumption, often at the expense of the powerful."

   In retrospect, he revisits how his career attempted to impart on people he met over the decades. "As a teacher, I relished motivating my students to remain intensely committed to the pursuit of knowledge, be respectful of the essence of divergency even as they sought to embrace critical thinking and contribute to the construction of knowledge." And as a painter, he "employs a variety of media to inveigh against economic constructs and political shenanigans that wreak unimaginable havoc on unsuspecting publics while perpetuating the subaltern condition of the underclass."

  Last year, jegede's 70th birthday had community of art academia in Lagos celebrated the artist whose career has inspired quite some professionals cross art and culture disciplines.
   Excerpts from his bio: jegede is a Professor Emeritus at Miami University, Oxford, Ohio. After a first-class honors degree in studio art from the Ahmadu Bello University, Zaria, Nigeria, he obtained his Masters and doctorate degrees from Indiana University, Bloomington, U.S.A where he studied under Professor Roy Sieber.
 His professional experience includes several solo and group exhibitions in Nigeria and the U.S and a long list of scholarly publications on diverse aspects of African, and African-American art. He began his career at the Daily Times of Nigeria as Art Editor and cartoonist before moving to the University of Lagos, Akoka, Yaba, Nigeria in 1977, and eventually became Director of the Center for Cultural Studies. In the late 1970s and 1980s, he was adjunct faculty at Yaba College of Technology where he taught Drawing and Art History. He was Fulbright Scholar at Spelman College, Atlanta, Georgia, from 1987 to1988, where he curated an exhibition of the collection of African Art at Spelman College, with an accompanying catalog, Art by Metamorphosis. In 1989, he was elected President of the Society of Nigerian Artists, succeeding Professor Solomon Wangboje. He stepped down in 1992 when he accepted a position as faculty member at Indiana State University, Terre Haute, to which he relocated with his family in January 1993. In 1995, he was at the National Museum of African Art, Smithsonian Institution, Washington DC as Senior Post-Doctoral Fellow.

Prof dele jegede

He was active on the Arts Council of the African Studies Association (ACASA) and served as its President from1996 to1998. His academic administrative positions include Professor and Chair of Department at Indiana State University, Terre Haute, and also at Miami University, Oxford, Ohio, where he retired as Professor Emeritus in 2015. He led accreditation teams for the National Association of Schools of Art and Design (NASAD), on whose Board of Directors he also served. He is recipient of the Distinguished Africanist Award of the University of Texas at Austin. In 2014, a 422- page book, Art, Parody and Politics: dele jegede's Creative Activism, Nigeria and the Transnational Space, edited by Aderonke Adesanya and Toyin Falola, was published by Africa World Press. It focuses on the artist's work as scholar, cartoonist, painter, and administrator, and features 18 chapters of essays written by 15 scholars. His latest book, Onobrakpeya: Masks of the Flaming Arrows (Milan: 5 Continents) was published in 2014 and remains the authoritative book on the African icon, Bruce Onobrakpeya.
  jegede is actively engaged in full-time studio practice in Cincinnati, Ohio.