Tobenna Okwuosa's "From Historical Facts to Poetic Truths" at the African Culture and Design Festival.

Tobenna Okwuosa.

Mathew B. Oyedele

Three books by Nigerian writers - The Man Died by Wole Soyinka, There Was a Country: A Personal History of Biafra by Chinua Achebe and Labyrinths by Christopher Okigbo inspired the recent works of Tobenna Okwuosa that were exhibited at the African Culture and Design Festival, in November 2017. These books offer a profound archive for the artist to delve into the past and create an oeuvre that confronts the viewer with guilt-ridden contents.

2017 was the 50th anniversary of the declaration of Biafra, and 50 years after the death of Christopher Okigbo on war front, fighting for Biafra. Okwuosa’s exhibits show the  historical facts of the Biafran War and the poetic truths of Christopher Okigbo. The Biafran War is a vital and sensitive aspect of Nigerian history that should be known to all Nigerians so that we may, to borrow an expression, transform yesterday’s action into tomorrow’s wisdom.

The provocation of conversations in the collection begins with, The Man Died, a mixed-media painting whose composition is arranged to emphasize a representational image of Wole Soyinka at the right side. The black horizontal lines piercing through the yellow background separates it into rectangles and contributes to the flatness of the picture plane. There are inscriptions across the background and the text, “The man died” boldly written between the rectangles. A silhouetted image of a soldier at the left side and a static image of a dead man at the foreground complete a somewhat diagonal composition.

Tobenna Okwuosa "The Man Died", Mixed Media.

The iconography of this work is drawn from Wole Soyinka’s civil war memoir, The Man Died, whose contents were incubated inside the prison cells where Soyinka was incarcerated by Yakubu Gowon during the Civil War. Soyinka was going to entitle his prison note: “A Slow Lynching”, until he received a telegram about a journalist, Segun Sowemimo who was brutally beaten by soldiers on the orders of a Military Governor. It took the incessant persuasion of his trade union to get the Governor to fly Segun Sowemimo to England for treatment as his condition worsened. He was sent back home as his condition was without remedy and after six weeks at home, Soyinka received a telegram that reads: “The man died”. 

The conversation continues in another engaging work by the artist, 'The man dies in all who keep silent in the face of tyranny'. At the bottom half of the plane is a man in a sitting position who hides his face between his knees. The white background has a repetitive inscription: The man dies in all who keep silent in the face of tyranny. Soyinka is depicted with his eyes closed at the top right side of the plane. He is enclosed in a red rectangle with rows of black circles and yellow symbols. The relevance of this work in this contemporary era cannot be underestimated. The Nigerian landscape is full of politicians who do not only loot the country dry but also play on the intelligence of the masses; yet, everyone acquiesces.

Tobenna Okwuosa, "The Man dies in all who keep silent in the face of tyranny", Mixed Media.

There Was a Country is one of the most significant works in the historical corpus. The title is derived from Chinua Achebe’s last book There Was a Country: A Personal History of Biafra. In this axial composition, Odumegwu Ojukwu stands in the center of the plane with his hands raised holding sheet of papers in both hands. The Biafran flag stands on a table before him and a dominant red, with black horizontal lines provide a contrast in the background. The foreground has a black colour and an inscription, “There was a country” in yellow.  

Tobenna Okwuosa, "There was a country", Mixed Media.

Before You Mother Idoto, Naked I stand, communicates an expressive content that is markedly different from the civil war context; it is a confirmation of the poetic truths of Christopher Okigbo. A muscular man stands barefooted and naked in an inverted pyramid with his arms stretched out in a surrendering position. He stands backing the spectator. There are clusters of circles arranged in shapes of pyramid around the plane and the conformity of the axis to a vertical line enclosed the work in a rectangular composition. He stands before Mother Idoto, a water-goddess known for her fecundity and purity. He waits with an outstretched arm, naked and barefooted, to affirm his readiness to be immersed totally into his heritage and traditions.

Tobenna Okwuosa, "Before you Mother Idoto, naked I stand", Mixed Media.

The artist’s oeuvre is just a part of the series of events that commemorates the 50^th anniversary of the declaration of Biafra; there were talks, lectures, and exhibitions in different parts of the world. The Vice President of Nigeria spoke at a conference titled, “Memory and nation Building, Biafra: 50 years after”, in Abuja on May 25, 2017. In his lecture titled, “We are greater together than apart”, he highlights how we should learn from history in lieu of learning from experience; that history is a gentler and kinder teacher.

Besides Tobenna Okwuosa, Olu Oguibe is another artist who in 2017 explored the history of Biafra in his installation art. Oguibe’s installation of books, magazines, documents, and materials related to the Biafran War at the EMST-National Museum of Contemporary Art, Athens with the title, Biafra Time Capsule, was part of the buildup to Documenta XIV in Kassel, Germany. “Biafra’s Children: A Survivor’s Gathering” was also organized by Olu Oguibe, where the likes of Faith Adiele, Phillip U. Effion, Okey Ndibe, Vivian Ogbonna and E.C. Osondu, among others, shared their stories of the war which claimed three million lives.

In a society that constantly strives to forget and erase every aspect of its history, Tobenna Okwuosa’s courage to explore historical subject is noteworthy. He states: “I am aware that those who fail to know and remember their history will not be able to deal with their present challenges, and will certainly have a more chaotic future. It is sad that we know a lot about western history, but very little about ours. Our history must be taught in schools!”.