This year featured a rich mix of artists and galleries, both new to 1-54 and a lot of those making their returns. A diverse range of 160 artists amd 60 exhibitors from across Africa, Brazil and beyond. There were the conventional, the zany and the envelope pushers but what seemed clear was that every iteration of 1-54 Art fair is a referendum on contemporary African art
A 1987 graduate of Film as Fine Art from Central St. Martin's School of Art, Zak Ove worked in film and music, collaborating with bands such as Soul 2 Soul. Fascinated by the new direction of black music, he said he engaged often with the question of “how do I translate the screaming of hip hop music like Public Enemy into something static; how do you make a sculpture scream?”
"One day, I spilled coffee on paper and when I looked at it I realized I could make art from it."
This is my third time at 1 -54 since it was launched in 2013 by Touria El Glaoui, as the pre-eminent international fair dedicated to providing visibility to contemporary art from Africa artists and those in the diaspora. 1-54 holds three editions every year—in London, New York and Marrakech with a pop-up fair in Paris
In Africa, only a glutton feasts alone. That truism has been highlighted in stories and myths across the continent from...
Mr. Boateng styles himself as the apostle of Hueism, a photographic style that privileges the black body and subject presented with/in a burst of bright colours and joy.
“At Kokab's House of Art, we believe in nurturing creativity and encouraging young minds to express themselves,” says Mrs. Kokab Farrukh, founder and curator of the exhibition. “This exhibition is more than just a showcase; it’s an opportunity for our students to share their vision with the community, to inspire, and to spark conversations about the world around us.”
With almost 1,000 book, music, movie, and sundry reviews and essays published over the past four (4) years, we remain resolute in our belief that reviews offer us the first critical engagement with a work of art, books, movies, music, plays etc, because they help shape opinion, excite conversation, and push engagement.As we enter our 5th year, we remain committed to providing a unique space for interrogating our literary and artistic output and providing a handle for the audience and those in the academia to assess these works of literature and art.
Her experiment anchors Folakunle Oshun’s words in his introduction that “at the heart of the exhibition is an exploration of the complexities of shifting notions of home and identity.”
The “Lagos, Peckham, Repeat: Pilgrimage To The Lakes” was a reminder that the immigrant is often no more than a tortoise and no matter how far the journey, he or she will always bear his or her home on her back.
The works reflect the thoughts process of the émigré but where a less competent artist would have presented gloomy and depressing images we have an exuberance borne out of his choice of colours which manage to save the portraits from depressing the viewer.
The first time an artist and a liquor company collaborated on a bottle was in 1985. Absolut was a Swedish...
Peju Oshin’s debut at the Gagosian may have broken footfall records for an opening night but its relevance lies beyond attendance numbers. It lies more in the urgent conversations it has managed to open up around issues that resonate in contemporary diasporic discourse.