Located inside The Radisson Blu Anchorage Hotel, Art Clip Africa is a contemporary space that promotes perceptive art across a variety of traditional and experimental media with the strategic objective of amplifying leading new voices in contemporary art from African scenes, with an initial centre on Lagos and Nigeria, taking reference from its social, economic, and political contexts.
Above Whispers Team visited the art gallery and was a guest at the Gallery’s ‘Artist talk with Babajide Olatunji’ with the theme ‘Preserving History through Art’ on friday, february 12, 2016. We got to know this was a follow-up event to the gallery’s ‘The Book of Proverbs’ exhibition which was launched last November. It featured selected works of Babajide Olatunji, since that time, the artist has spent weeks as Art Clip’s first Artist-in-Residence.
Guests walked through an evolution of Babajide Olatunji’s works, starting with the Tribal Marks Series I and II, flowing into the Tribal Hamptons series, and ending with The Book of Proverbs, which reflected a new direction in the Olatunji’s work.
The scale of the works created by Olatunji had many in awe as they discovered that the highly detailed charcoal and pastel portraits are of fictional characters drawn from the artist’s imagination. To realise each work, Olatunji creates a story for each of his subjects in which personality, character, skin-type and even medical history play a part.
The Tribal Marks series draws from Olatunji’s extensive research into the age-old practice of facial scarifications, interactions and discussions with carriers of these marks while The Book of Proverbs reflects visual interpretations of age-old Yoruba proverbs, from the south-western region of Nigeria.
Speaking to the artist, who said he started experimenting with art at the age of 5. He stated that his motivation comes from the need to preserve our culture, in his words ‘our cultures aredying out and we are not doing enough to document or teach them’. He also wished Nigerians will pay more attention to art but expressed a sense of understanding in view of the soci0-economic circumstances in the country.
About Art Clip Africa.
Located in the Radisson BLU Anchorage Hotel, Lagos, Art Clip displays both established and up and coming talents with the strategic objective of amplifying leading new voices in contemporary art from African scenes, with an initial centre on Lagos and Nigeria, taking reference from its social, economic, and political contexts.
Every year, Art Clip Africa will invite six contemporary artists, who have proven their commitment to creating art, to each undertake residencies at the Art Clip studio. The Art Clip Residency is dedicated to supporting and advancing the works of African visual artists by providing them the facilities to create art while surrounded by inspiration in a location in the heart of Lagos City.
For more information, visit
Address: Art Clip Africa at The Radisson Blu Anchorage Hotel, 1A Ozumba Mbadiwe Road, Victoria Island, Lagos
Email: info@artclipafrica.com
Phone: +234 708 4344 856
Website: www.artclipafrica.com
Twitter: https://twitter.com/artclipafrica
Facebook: https://facebook.com/artclipafrica
Instagram: https://instagram.com/artclipafrica