The Yemisi Shyllon Museum of Art (YSMA) has been awarded the Museum Opening of The Year 2020 by the Apollo Magazine, an international publication that specializes in the world of art on an international scale. The award is presented to museums, which opened recently and have since been in operation. The other shortlisted museums are Aberdeen Art Gallery (reopened November 2019), The Box, Plymouth (opened September 2020), British Galleries, Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York (reopened March 2020), Gemäldegalerie Alte Meister und Skulpturensammlung bis 1800, Dresden (reopened February 2020) and KBR Museum, Brussels (opened September 2020).
Yemisi Shyllon Museum of Art is the art museum of the Pan-Atlantic University located in Lagos, Nigeria, and is named after Prince Yemisi Shyllon, an art collector and businessman, who along with funding the construction of the museum donated over 1000 artworks from his vast collection that includes ancient art from Benin, Ife and Nok artists; modern artworks by Aina Onabolu, Ben Enwonwu, Uche Okeke, Yusuf Grillo, Nike Okundaye, and Bruce Onobrakpeya; and contemporary artworks by El Anatsui, Lamidi Fakeye, Ayobola Kekere-Ekun, and Ben Osaghae among many others.
The museum officially began operations in October 2019 and emerged winners from a shortlist of notable nominees. The award was presented to the YSMA by Apollo Magazine during an award ceremony held on November 18-19, 2020.
The museum opened with two exhibitions. The first, showing on the museum’s ground floor, titled ‘Making Matter’, highlighted materiality and technology in Nigerian art. The second exhibition, ‘Mirroring Man’, explored society and politics as influences on Nigerian art and showed on the museum’s top floor. Both exhibitions featured works donated to the museum by Prince Shyllon, others coming from the university collection and from Nigerian collectors and artists.
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According to Dr. Jess Castellote, the museum’s director and designer, the architecture of the museum follow the principles that inspired the design of all the other buildings of the Pan-Atlantic University: fitness for purpose, flexibility, sustainability, and character. The flexible space allows the museum to change its display configuration according to changing curatorial demands. The excellent thermal insulation of the external walls and the efficient air circulation throughout the single “exhibition space” require a minimum air conditioning load.
The designers gave great attention to security, environmental control, efficient lighting, display quality, and ease of circulation. In addition, the rotund shape, a clean cube of 30 x 30 x 11 meters, and the richly textured finish of the stained concrete walls give the museum building an iconic character that makes it stand out on the campus lawns.
Dr. Castellote further stated that being a university Museum, the YSMA is primarily an educational resource at the service not only of the Pan-Atlantic University but also of the larger community. The museum will develop community educational programs for students of public schools, as well as, training programs for art teachers, which would be made possible through corporate partnerships, donations, and collaborations with artists.
The museum will adopt an audience-centred approach in its curatorial and educational methods. Pan-Atlantic University offers a transformative educational experience and has the integral formation of the person and the advancement of responsible citizenship as her core mission. Hence, the YSMA, as a unit of the University, will measure its success by the level of impact on her audiences, rather than the number of visitors.
‘Investment Chat In A Rolls-Royce With Stephen Akintayo’ set to premiere
A new show tagged Investment Chat in a Rolls-Royce with Stephen Akintayo is set to premiere on Nigerian screens and online via Youtube and Facebook on Sunday, November 22, 2020.
The show, produced with the sum of N30 million is directed by Bunmi Davies with Stephen Akintayo of the Gtext fame as the executive producer and host. A first-of-its-kind celebrity guest show, every week, the celebrity guest takes a luxurious ride with Akintayo in a Rolls-Royce while discussing matters of investment.
Speaking on what inspired the show, he said, “One of the reasons we started this show was that we realised that investment conversations are quite boring. People all over the world are attracted to luxury, but they do not know what goes on before luxury comes. We then decided to mix the two by showing our audience the luxury while telling them the truth about investment. That gets people’s attention and helps us educate people on investment in a fun, luxurious way.”
Going further, Akintayo explained that while the show is not a one-stop-shop for everything about investment, it is majorly to get conversations on investment going, seeing as many consider the topic of investment uninteresting and sometimes technical. With screen icons and entertainment industry stakeholders speaking on investment, many more people are likely to listen, especially since many of them would be sharing from personal experience.
Going by trailer, the audience is in for an engaging screen experience as already, personalities like star actress, Joke Silva; comedian cum actor, Gbenga Adeyinka; media personality cum politician, Dayo Adeneye; and screen icon, Ada Ameh; have been spotted taking a ride in a Rolls-Royce with Akintayo.
Premiering on Channel Television this Sunday at 2:30 pm, the show is the latest, quality addition to Nigeria’s repertoire of educational programmes.
