Onyeka Igwe’s Art Now display, our generous mother, explores the University of Ibadan, the oldest degree-awarding institution in Nigeria. Moving through the university’s tropical modernist architecture, the film traces the building’s personal and political histories, from its colonial roots through to national independence, civil war and towards the present day.
Visitors will enter a dark green space which hosts the film in multiple guises. It first takes the form of a Perspex sculpture that fractures the content, alluding to the multiple ways one place can be understood. Towards the middle of the space, the work takes the form of a slide projection. At the back of the gallery, the film then concludes in digital form, projected upon a large cinematic wall.
Across all these different iterations of her work, Igwe draws from her own interest in radical filmmaking to deconstruct the history of the University of Ibadan.
Read an essay on Igwe's work, our mother's peculiar mess by Xavier Alexandre Pillai.
Art Now: Onyeka Igwe is supported by the Bukhman Foundation. With additional support from the Art Now Supporters Circle and Tate Americas Foundation.
