Sophie Blower
Trainee
Modern & Contemporary African Art Online / Bruce Onobrakpeya (Nigerian, born 1932) Afieki I
Lot 42
*
Bruce Onobrakpeya
(Nigerian, born 1932)
Afieki I
3 – 17 August 2022, 12:00 BST
London, New Bond Street£2,000 - £3,000
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Bruce Onobrakpeya (Nigerian, born 1932)
Afieki I
signed and dated 'Bruce Onobrakpeya, Lagos/ Sep 1978' (lower right); numbered, titled and inscribed '1/30 Afieki I (metal base)' (lower left); further inscribed 'deep etching' (lower centre)
deep foil etching on board
62 x 88cm (24 7/16 x 34 5/8in).
signed and dated 'Bruce Onobrakpeya, Lagos/ Sep 1978' (lower right); numbered, titled and inscribed '1/30 Afieki I (metal base)' (lower left); further inscribed 'deep etching' (lower centre)
deep foil etching on board
62 x 88cm (24 7/16 x 34 5/8in).
Footnotes
Provenance
Acquired by the present owner's family in Lagos, Nigeria, circa 1979;
A private collection, Nigeria;
Thence by direct descent to the present owner in 2020.
Literature
Safy Quel, ed., Bruce Onobrakpeya: Symbols of Ancestral Groves. Monograph of Prints and Paintings, 1978-1985 (Lagos: Ovuomaroro Gallery, 1985), p. 66.
Afieki is the Urhobo word for marketplace. The image was 'inspired by the mystical atmosphere' which is perceived to surround traditional market places in Nigeria. One of a number of works on the Afieki theme, the present work draws from 'the popular beliefs about spirits and animals who also buy and sell in the market place but remain invisible to the uninitiated eye. They commit havoc or mess up opened food commodities like palm-oil' (Quel, 1985: p. 66).
Bibliography
Safy Quel, ed., Bruce Onobrakpeya: Symbols of Ancestral Groves. Monograph of Prints and Paintings, 1978-1985 (Lagos: Ovuomaroro Gallery, 1985)
dele jegede, ed., Onobrakpeya: Masks of the Flaming Arrows (Milan: 5 Continents Editions, 2014), no. 56, p. 45 (inverted Plastograph of image illustrated).
Dozie Igweze, The Storyteller of Agbarha-Otor: Bruce Onobrakpeya's Visual Tales (Lagos: Hourglass Books, 2018), p. 83 (inverted Plastograph of image illustrated, p. 82).