Obiora Udechukwu

Private Collection, Nigeria

Acquired from the above by the present owner

Obiora Udechukwu is one of the most significant painters and poets of the Nsukka school that emerged from the University of Nigeria in the late 1960s. A student of Uche Okeke, he used uli extensively, interlacing specific motifs with explorations of general linear style. In 1989, the year the present lot was painted, he held a solo exhibition Nsukka Landscape: Paintings and Prints at the Italian Cultural Institute, Lagos, "using heavier, denser and darker colours to relay a deep psychological mood of frustration" with the military government. That same year he also exhibited at the 3rd Biennial of Havana in Cuba. His work has been exhibited and collected by such august institutions as the Museum of Modern Art, New York; The Smithsonian National Museum of African Art, Washington D.C.; and Tate Gallery, London.

Bibliography:

Chika Okeke-Agulu, Obiora Udechukwu: Line, Image, Text, 2020.