BRUCE ONOBRAKPEYA | THE BUILDERS

Private Collection, Lagos

“Steps by Step

We will march the clay.

One lump upon another

We will build a nation.”

‘The Builders’ poem by Bruce Onobrakpeya, Lagos 1978

The Builders (1978) is an original and unique plastocast, which depicts people marching and singing while carrying blocks and cement to build a house. Widely celebrated for his contributions to modern Nigerian art and printmaking, Prof. Onobrakpeya studied at the Nigeria College of Arts, Science and Technology (NCAST) in the late 1950s, now the Ahmadu Bello University, Zaria. On 9 October 1958, he and a group of art students at the college led by Uche Okeke founded of the Zaria Arts Society, later called the Zaria Rebels, with the aim of decolonizing the visual arts as taught by expatriate Europeans. This group believed in the celebration of indigenous Nigerian cultures as a central part of its art movement. Onobrakpeya’s work has been exhibited internationally, including at the Smithsonian National Museum of African Art (Washington DC), the Dak’Art Biennale in 2006, and the Whitechapel Art Gallery (London), and is in the permanent collections of the Metropolitan Museum (New York), the National Gallery of Kenya (Nairobi), the Victoria and Albert Museum and British Museum (London), among many others.