Uzo Egonu

Sotheby's, Modern and Contemporary African Art, London, 28 March 2018,Lot 59

Acquired from the above sale by the present owner

Born in 1931 in Onitsha in south-east Nigeria, Egonu came to England in 1945, studying fine art and design at Camberwell School of Arts and Crafts 1949–52. He lived in England for the rest of his life, only returning to Nigeria once for a brief visit. The artist’s work harmoniously combines aesthetic traditions of both the West and Africa, reshaping the definition of Modernist art.

Egonu synthesised his formative years growing up in Nigeria with his academic training in European modernism, responding directly to events Nigeria as well as to his own personal circumstances as an expatriate in Britain. Without the means to return, but deeply concerned for his family, he closely followed developments in Nigeria and much of his work from this period relates to the mounting political tension in Nigeria in 1966 and the ensuing Biafran War (1967–70). He maintained ties to Africa, participating in the First World Festival of Negro Arts in Dakar, Senegal in 1966 and the Second World Festival of Arts and Culture (FESTAC) in Lagos, Nigeria in 1977.

Egonu exhibited internationally in solo and group shows, including alongside other Black and Minority Ethnic artists in the landmark exhibition The Other Story at the Hayward Gallery in 1989. Curator Rasheed Araeen described Egonu as "perhaps the first person from Africa, Asia or the Caribbean to come to Britain after the War with the sole intention of becoming an artist". He belonged to a generation of non-European artists who chose to live and work in London, but nevertheless struggled to receive institutional recognition for their contribution to the modernist discourse.

Compared to his Stateless People series (see lot 73), this early painting offers more figurative detail in the representative depiction of the scene at hand. Egonu’s work has been included in the collections of the Victoria and Albert Museum, the Arts Council of England, National Museum of Modern Art in Poland, and the National Gallery of Modern Art in Lagos, among others.