Artsdiscourse

Mathew Oyedele  With the ongoing happenings in the country, Samuel Ajobiewe is right to entitle his recent exhibition The Indignant Eye . These happenings did not just start but the faulty lines have always been there to be maneuvered by those who are entrusted with the sanctity of Nigerian institutions. The exhibition took its title from the 1969 book by Ralph E. Shikes which positions the artist as a social critic. Ajobiewe is not an unknown name in the Nigerian art scene. He is a renowned artist who works across diverse media including pastel, watercolour and acrylic. He had his first solo exhibition in 2009 at Mydrim Gallery in Lagos and has since gone on hiatus until his recent exhibition at the National Museum, Lagos. Perhaps the thirteen year hiatus has enabled him to observe, contemplate and solidify his socio-political commentaries. One of his bold socio-politically themed pieces at the exhibition, albeit satirical, is The Ineffectual Scarecrow , an acrylic on canvas piece...

Mathew Oyedele  Samuel Nnorom's The Politics of Fabrics is an exhibition of works that were created during a one-month residency program at Guest Artists Space Foundation, Lagos, Nigeria.  For the first time in his career, the artist who lives and works in Nsukka, was able to create works in Lagos – the economic and cultural capital of Nigeria – with materials obtained from it. The exhibited pieces continued the artist's interest in narratives and subjects around fabrics but marked a stylistic departure from his previous explorations of ankara fabrics which are centered around the examination of social structure, social organisation, human condition, safe spaces, distribution and distance. The new work looks at imported second-hand clothes from the West and how they affect the development of our local textile industry. These second-hand clothes and cast-off fabrics have different names in Nigeria. While they are popularly known as Okrika , they are also known as Akube , Bend D...

RIKKI WEMEGA-KWAWU PRELUDE   As a preamble to my article, I must stress with emphasis that “Ibrahim Mahama” alluded to in this paper IS NOT the Ghanaian business mogul, carrying the same name, Ibrahim Mahama. The Ibrahim Mahama referred to in this article is the internationally renowned Ghanaian artist, and Founder and CEO of the Savannah Centre for Contemporary Art (SCCA) and the Red Clay Studios, Tamale, Ghana. “'LOCATION '  – A Giant in Decay” is an essay I wrote in 2015, an Artist Statement, to accompany my application to participate in the 10th Bamako Encounters, the International Photo Festival in Bamako, Mali, curated by the late Nigerian International Curator, Bisi Silva (May she have Eternal rest). My application strangely got lost and never saw the light of day. I had previously shared in confidence the content of this essay and the photos accompanying it with an American girlfriend of artist Ibrahim Mahama (name withheld), who was pursuing curatorial studies in Gh...