From September 14-28, 2024, the Nigerian visual art landscape will be alive with as eight artists storm Alexis Galleries, Victoria Island, Lagos for an all-female exhibition titled ‘Nudus’.
The artists include: Djakou Kasai Nathalie, Ejiro Fenegal, Chidinma Nwafor, Elizabeth C. Ekpetorson, Almat Adams, Boluwatife Victoria Lawal, Adebimpe Owoyemi, and Ganiyat Abdulazeez. According to Alexis Galleries, the artists are carefully chosen based on merit to suite the purpose of the show.
At a media preview held in Lagos at the gallery, the artists spoke about their works, meanings and how they can help to grow the freedom of expression and self esteem of the modern women against societal criticisms and judgements.
Djakou Kasai Nathalie, one of them, is a Cameroonian ceramist, who worked with many renowned artists and obtained many distractions, awards and prizes in and out of Cameroon.
Nathalie is presenting six works and two ceramics. She has two titles: ‘The Nudus’ and ‘The Bride on Honeymoon’. The Nudus is a Greek word for nakedness. In the Nudus, Nathalie represents many ways of being naked. In one of her works she represented a wild woman who likes to strip people naked at a slightest provocation. Her work is a very way of exposing the nakedness of people through gossips and and revelation of secrets.
The other title: ‘Bride and the Honeymoon’ shows a newly wed couple, probably virgins, who are naked for the first time on the wedding night. The title reveals the hidden beauty of a bride’s nakedness on the wedding night.
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She also has other titles like ‘The Journal’ and ‘The Model’. ‘The Journal’ is a private document people use to express their private thoughts in writing. While ‘The Model’ talks about a beautiful lady who uses her body in different types of nakedness. She tries to symbolize nakedness in what people wear or say.
Ejiro Fenegal is a sculptor from Ugheli South, Delta State, Nigeria. She meticulously crafts figurative sculptures that delve into the complexities of human condition and symbolize the metaphorical prison that ensnares the mind. Ejiro believes that constraining emotions like fear, doubt, weakness and hate are detrimental to one’s existence.
In one of her work titles for the exhibition; ‘Galaxy’ (a collection of stars), Ejiro tells the stories of womanhood, how women can be portrayed in a positive manner. She speaks about how women were crafted in the olden days in making their hairstyles.
The artists portrays women as stars and objectsbof elements that people can look up to for inspiration. Her second title, ‘Olori’ (queen), is an ongoing series bshe explores front the beginning of this year to portray women to be symbol of respect and beauty around the world.
Chidinma Nwafor is a Nigerian visual artist from Anambra State. Her paintings address the complexities of life, with a particular focus on the burdens, expectations and struggles associated with the girl-child. She captures the subtle and facial expressions that reveal the complexities of human emotion, using the medium of oil paints to imbue her creations with depth and emotion.
Chidinma is showcasing three works at the exhibition; Within Walls and Without Amour, As We Drift Beyond.
In Within Walls and Without Amour, she tries to talk about the vulnerability of women in the society, where people judge women for the way they are. It is about women being vulnerable and being in a space where they are free from all judgements. The walls signifies a safe space where a woman can be free to without shielding herself from public judgements of her looks and dressings. It is about how the society view women in their dressing and body looks. Chidinma used her works to encourage women to accept the way they are.
In “As We Drift Beyond”, talks about a transformation process from the old self to a new perspective. She encourages people to embrace a better way of life – a departure from the old norms.
Elizabeth Ekpetorsonis a visual arts from Nigeria. She is a painter and draughtsman. Her figurative works body is about self acceptance and other subject matters catalyzed by swift responses to creative impulses on human issues. Her works draw attention to self acceptance; embracing one’s self unconditionally, without fear or exception.
Ekpetorson is exhibiting three works. One of the titles is “Comfortable In My Skin”. She tries to create the freedom that human personality posses. She used the painting to encourage people to be comfortable and natural in what they do and be truthful.
Her other title, “Beauty Is Relative”, which she used to encourage women to be proud of their natural beauty and body. All her works are figurative abstracts.
Almat Adams is a graduate of Ambrose Ali University, Ekpoma, Edo State, Nigeria. Her works explore her live for beauty, uniformity, genuine human emotions, cultural narratives and how they affect people. A figurative painter with profound draftsmanship and subtle gradation of light and shade.
She is exhibiting three works with the titles: “One Verbal In Her Radiance, Sovereign Grace and In our Elements”
Adams used her paint in Verbal In Her Radiance to talk about women empowerment, freedom and harmony. The work portrays a woman shining her inner confidence and joy embracing her sexuality as a source of her strength. In Sovereign Grace, she tries to portray a woman in her beauty, autonomy and nudity. While her title In Her Elements, showcase a woman in total peace with her body, reflecting in her self assurance with her beauty. Her works embraces self assurance and sexuality talking about modern liberation with African traditional textiles to create dynamic visuals.
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Boluwatife Victoria Lawal is a contemporary Nigerian artist who hails from Ibadan, Oyo State of Nigeria. She works predominantly in acrylics on canvas, where she masterfully crafts inmates and conjoined portraits of people of colour in swirls of evocative, vibrant colours. Her practice dwells on social construct and inter-personality of identity, race and gender.
Adebimpe Owoyemi is a graduate of University of Benin and bags her BA and MFA from the same institution. Currently she is working on a project to create figurative paintings in Aso Ike – an idea to foster and promote our identity and culture. The infusion of Aso Ike in her paintings goes beyond aesthetics, it exudes fashion statements that are timeless yet native in content. Each pattern, colour, line and style tell a different story.
Owoyemi is exhibiting three works. One of her titles, “Coat of Many Colours” represents an infusion of Aso Oke in her figurative paintings. Aso Oke is a local attire in. Yoruba culture. It is a rich tradition that carries a lot of meanings and story tellings. As women most-imes, they keep to themselves from psychological and mental vulnerability. Coat of Many Colours is about a woman wrapped with different colours of aso oke which represents people in Yoruba culture.
Ganiyat Abdulazeez explores a diversity of media spanning pastels, graphites, charcoal, watercolors, acrylic and oil (her most favoured). In her recent works, she incorporates distinctive floral motives – believed to have a deep connection with her childhood and people’s experiences in her portraits. The recurring phenomenon in her works is called Jatropha Multifida.
She has three titles, “Finding The Real Face and Unbroken” talk about the survival of a woman, the brutality that women go through from the olden days till the present era. It talks about women fighting for their freedom.
The works portrays how the society sees women as properties that can be owned, how the female child is denied access to education in some cultures in Nigeria. It also depict how the girl-child is married off at a very tender age without empowerment. Abdulazeez used her paintings to protect women from nudity- freedom from brutality.
The curator, Patty Chidiac, said that the female artists were carefully selected to meet the purpose of the exhibition as they complement one another trying to interpret their individual works differently.
The exhibition is sponsored by Mikano, The Macallan, The Guardian, Coca Cola, Hair Thermocol, Aina Blankson Global, Bobby Sapphire, Cobranet, UPS, Schweppes, Nigeria Info, Tiger, Artcafe and Berol.
