A-ARTs: Maiden Exhibition Of Nine Printmaking Grandmasters In Contemporary Nigerian Art

'Principle of Good Governance' (brass foil, 29x38.5 inches, dated 1988) by Dr Bruce Onobrakpeya.

By Rasheed Amodu

A group exhibition featuring nine printmaking grandmasters in contemporary Nigerian art will be staged at Fobally Art Gallery, Lagos, Nigeria, from August 10th to 30th, 2025. The grandmasters in chronological order are Chief Tayo Aiyegbusi, Prof. Solomon Wangboje, Prof. Bruce Onobrakpeya, Prof. Uche Okeke, Mr. David Dale, Mr. Ademola Williams, Prof. Salubi Onakufe, Mr. Tayo Quaye, and Dr. Kunle Adeyemi. While four of them are late, Aiyegbusi, Wangboje, Okeke and Dale, the remaining five, Onobrakpeya, Williams, Onakufe, Quaye, and Adeyemi, are still practising.

A foremost grandmaster printmaker, Aiyegbusi, whose prints will be displayed in this exhibition, trained abroad in the US and England between 1952 and 1957. Aiyegbusi returned to Nigeria after his studies abroad in the late 1950s and started his art practice as a graphic artist and printmaker, while Wangboje, Onobrakpeya and Okeke were still undergraduates. He was an influential artistic figure to some younger artists of that era, including Wangboje and Onobrakpeya.

Bruce Onobrakpeya affirmed that by 1967, he reached what seems like the "peak of block printing (lino and woodcut) techniques". Hence, it was that year, 1967 (58 years ago), that he started building his creative empire as a frontline printmaking grandmaster in contemporary Nigerian art. Although Onobrakpeya was partly inspired by Aiyegbusi's print and practice, according to him, the major influence in his printmaking adventure was fired off when he saw some prints on display at the Kaduna Trade Fair around 1959, which he attended as an undergraduate with two of his classmates. The Kaduna Trade Fair's exhibited prints were made by secondary school art students of the Keffi Government College, Keffi, Kogi State, Nigeria. Onobrakpeya was following his printmaking instinct and inspiration from his late 1950s experience when he started attending printmaking workshops in 1961 and 1963 in Ibadan and Oshogbo, respectively. Onobrakpeya is metaphorically referred to as the father of printmaking in contemporary Nigerian art. Though Aiyegbusi was a foremost printmaking grandmaster in Contemporary Nigerian art, he was not extensively documented and not nationally or globally renowned like Onobrakpeya.

Wangboje contributed to the establishment of printmaking as a major art form in academia. He lectured at the University of Ife, Ife, before moving on to become a lecturer at his alma mater, Ahmadu Bello University, Zaria. Wangboje left Zaria for the University of Benin, Benin, and started the Creative Arts Department, which later became a Faculty. Wangboje was the first Dean of the Faculty. He also established a postgraduate Master of Fine Arts (MFA) tradition in printmaking at Benin.

Two printmaking grandmasters will be exhibiting with their former lecturer in this show, Ademola Williams and Kunle Adeyemi, who were former postgraduate students of Solomon Wangboje. They graduated as Master of Fine Arts (MFA) post graduate students in printmaking at the University of Benin. In the same vein, Adeyemi and Tayo Quaye were former printmaking interns at Onobrakpeya's Ovuomaroro studio/ gallery. Salubi Onakufe is Onabrakpeya’s younger cousin; thus, there is a special printmaking bond between them. Onakufe, as an artist and family member, is usually involved in most of Onobrakpeya’s creative ventures, including the Ovuomaroro Studio/Gallery in Mushin, Lagos, and the Harmattan Workshops series in Aghar-Otoor, Delta State, Nigeria, among others. Thus, becoming a grandmaster printmaker seems to run in the family.

While Aiyegbusi was a foremost printmaking grandmaster in contemporary Nigerian art, Wangboje was more popular in academia, but Onobrakpeya is extensively documented and renowned across different frontiers than all the other grandmasters acknowledged in this exhibition. However, David Dale's creativity and artistic supremacy were also globally acknowledged. Dale's health challenges, especially paralysis and rheumatic attack on his right hand and fingers due to excessive etching and engraving, put a temporary halt to his printmaking in the early to mid-1990s. After having an operation on the affected hand and fingers, Dale was unable to produce prints at the same rate and volume again because of the risk of permanent nerve damage to his right hand. This inspired his successful artistic foray into other genres of visual art outside the printmaking spectrum, which led to him being documented as a rare genius who has mastered the employment of twenty-three different art media in his art practice and oeuvre.

Who is a Master before Becoming a Grandmaster?

A master is a level or some levels below a grandmaster in whatever profession one might want to discuss. A grandmaster in any discipline is at the highest point of that profession. Therefore, a printmaking grandmaster in Nigerian art is at the highest level of printmaking in Nigeria. Hence, the nine grandmaster printmakers are separate masters from other professionally or otherwise younger master printmakers or printmaking artists/ students in contemporary Nigerian art.

Nine Printmaking Grandmasters' Works

Most of Aiyegbusi's prints are stylised human and animal forms which are embellished with traditional Nigerian/ African patterns in a peculiar aesthetic standard of a foremost printmaking grandmaster of Contemporary Nigerian art. Aiyegbusi's prints revealed an affinity with Traditional Yoruba cum Nigerian/ African wood sculptures of yore, thereby affirming the cultural inspiration and significance of his prints' Africanness and negritude essence without any doubt.

'Drummer's Ensemble' (paintocast , ivorex mixed, 48x72 inches, dated 2021) by Dr Kunle Adeyemi.

Wangboje's prints were inspired by Nigerian/ African culture with formal and contextual colour mastery. His prints are often realistic with occasional symbolic silhouette images laid on quasi-abstract colourful bases. His themes cut across different topics, moving from traditional African subject matters to contemporary issues with ease.

Onobrakpeya is eclectic in his creative odyssey of pushing the frontiers of numerous printmaking techniques beyond the known and generally accepted standard. Serendipitously, he even discovered 'deep-etching' while trying to produce a print in standard etching technique, which is known as "Plastograph" in printmaking terminology. Some of his prints dwell on Urhobo cultural themes with folkloric, surreal and abstract traditional patterns.

Okeke's works dwell more on his Igbo ethnic group's Uli patterns and cultural themes. Uli are traditional Igbo body decorative patterns, which, to some extent, were later included in wall and shrine paintings, among the Igbo ethnic group in Nigeria. Whether in his prints or paintings/ drawings, Uli's forms and contextual ideology are often the major focus.

Dale's works mostly reflect Nigerian essence but with a more realistic and graphically detailed formal finishing in most cases. Though most of his forms and themes are Afrocentric, like Wangboje, Dale sparingly employs Nigerian and African traditional patterns in a supportive manner in most of his prints. Like Onobrakpeya, Dale is not limited to the mastery of two or three printmaking techniques; he also has a limitless mastery of many printmaking techniques in the creative spectrum.

Williams' prints are abstract or stylised Nigerian/ African images and pattern-inspired expressions. Whether in his linocut and woodcut, screen printing and etching or engraving, among others, Williams's prints are usually embedded with his Nigerian Yoruba ethnic group's cultural and folkloric images with contextually unmistakable African aura. His prints are mostly monochromatic in nature without any overstressed patterns/ motifs or forms.

Onakufe does not belabour his prints with traditional patterns and images that are commonplace in the prints of some of the other grandmaster printmakers. He allows his themes and subject matters to contextually reflect his Niger Delta essence. Some of his other prints focus on global thematic reality, often with monochromatic finishing.

Quaye's printmaking expressions oscillate between stylised or semi-realistic forms and abstract images, but are coupled with traditional Nigerian/ African patterns in most of his works. Most of his prints are essentially Nigerian/ African in their thematic and contextual finishing. Quaye's formal rendering and themes aptly reflect his Africanist and global worldview.

Adeyemi promotes more of his Ondo-Yoruba cultural images and patterns in most of his artworks. He is unapologetically Nigerian and African in his oeuvre of prints. Adeyemi crisscrosses from abstract representations and quasi-realism/stylisations in his compositions. Like Onobrakpeya and Dale, Adeyemi has a mastery of most of the printmaking techniques in the art world.

This exhibition is timely and significant because it is unique and different, thus adding something new and different from the regular shows that the Lagos/ Nigerian art scene is used to. Exhibiting the nine printmaking grandmasters in contemporary Nigerian art by Fobally Art Gallery, which will come in August this year (2025), will further aid the growth and popularity of printmaking in the Nigerian and global art communities.

-Rasheed Amodu, Artist, Art Historian/ Critic. Lagos, Nigeria.

self-reflection inspired olusola's watercolour