May 01, (THEWILL) – The longest running exhibition opened last week in the Federal Capital Territory mounted by multidisciplinary artist Ken Nwadiogbu in collaboration with Dolly Kola-Balogun Creative Director and founder of Retro Africa. Maurice Chapot is the curator.
The exhibition which opened to the public last week will run for three months until June 23. It is one of a kind. Nwadiogbu is an award-winning artist. Fascinated by some of his experiences in his natal country, and like most creative people do, Nwadiogbu captured them in his works – oil on canvas, installations, animation and much else.
One installation, for instance, is titled “Jesus of Lubeck.” Spectators might be deceived by the name Lubeck, a city in Germany which the installation has nothing to do with. In truth, Jesus of Lubeck is a throwback to the slave trade in Badagry in the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries.
Another is an animation and digital recreation of migrants. Recently, the UK government announced it was going to resettle African migrants in an African country – Rwanda specifically. Nwadiogbu saw it as fodder for his creative cannon. “In playful colours and simple forms,” a brochure of the exhibition reads, “Ken Nwadiogbu critically addresses this sensitive subject, inviting us to embrace new perspectives. Using personified cardboard boxes as vivid metaphors of black migrants, he plays around with the parcels’ disposable nature, underlining the dehumanisation process at work in the migration politics.”
To be sure, Nwadiogbu isn’t a household name in the Nigerian artistic pantheon yet, like a Chika Okeke, for instance, or Victor Ehikhamenor. But he is inching his way up there, especially now with his first and solo exhibition in Abuja. Though one would have expected the show at any of the pricey galleries in Lagos, culture capital of Nigeria, spectators in Abuja were nor disappointed at the opening night.
A series of 12 paintings were mounted, not to mention the installations. Credited with “introducing the ‘Contemporealism’ movement, a fusion that is primarily centred on Hyper-Realism and Contemporary art, Nwadiogbu captures figuratively painted memories to drive conversations about the way of life of people living in Nigeria,” boasts a brochure. “it is his hope that these people begin to interact with the viewer, constantly expressing what it feels like to be them.”
Though his paintings on the politics of migration spoke volume to spectators at the exhibition ground, the artist has voiced his concern about the issue nonetheless. “For me, this is a statement on migration in this time. It is me encouraging people not to follow the “ship of no return”. It’s great to migrate, but even greater to return. If we keep leaving (without plans of returning), there’ll be nobody to champion change in the country.”
Born in 1994 and based in Lagos, Nwadiogbu is a self-taught multidisciplinary artist though he is a professional civil engineer. He started with charcoal drawings before graduating to painting, sculpture and installation. For Nwadiogbu, “there’s no one perspective of looking at the world. Your view of how you see the world is different from my view. I believe the rare ability to see the world from a different perspective other than yours is what humanity is all about. Empathy thrives from there, Ubuntu becomes achievable.”
What drives this particular exhibition mostly is the theme of migration spectators notice all around. It is a subject matter that has preoccupied several other artists, writers and documentary film makers. Helon Habila, professor of Creative Writing at George Mason University, Fairfax, focused on migration in his most recent novel, Travelers published in 2020. Ben Taub of the New Yorker wrote a lengthy and gripping feature piece on the dangers involved in African migrants looking to making it good in Europe via the Sahara through the Mediterranean.
Nwadiobgu is similarly concerned about an exodus that has European and African diplomats in tizzy. “For me,” the artist has said about his works depicting the migrants through various medium, “this is a statement on migration in this time. It is me encouraging people not to follow the “ship of no return”. It’s great to migrate, but even greater to return. If we keep leaving (without plans of returning), there’ll be nobody to champion change in the country.”
It is possible the series on migration may never have been but for the UK Government’s plan to resettle African migrants in the central African country. “As the UK recently announced in a dramatic statement the outsourcing of Asylum seekers to Rwanda for processing, migration took the light once again as a serious, and challenging matter of concern on the global stage.”
At Retro Africa is a fashionable gallery and sort of mecca for artists and creative types in Abuja. It is also a “platform for emerging and established artists through a range of creative outlets such as curated exhibitions, art fairs, intercultural dialogues and online media.” Retro Africa’s aim “is to spread awareness and encourage a cycle of growth and learning within the African art scene.”
Though more than a week into the show, spectators have till late June to soak in Nwadiogbu’s message through his art.
About the Author
Michael Jimoh is a Nigerian journalist with many years experience in print media. He is currently a Special Correspondent with THEWILL.
