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ENGLISHMAN IN BENIN CITY, 1981 (Part Twenty-One)
When Steve offered us a cigarette, I took one out of the pack he extended.
It was from one of the packs he brought from Britain a couple of months earlier.
I was not good with cigarettes. But I was also not good at saying no to cigarette offers. All my friends smoked. And I loved to hold a stick of cigarette stylishly and watch the smoke rise from the tip of the ashes.
We sat there in the dark, watching the moon, smoking, silent. Suddenly, a bolt of lightning crashed across the sky, followed by a ripping sound of thunder. Instantly, the moon and the stars disappeared, and the sky was an endless black canvas coughing out intermittent flashes of jagged lights filled with throbs of thunder.
Post-Naija Flip-Flop
Post-Naija Flip-Flop
We are now in a Post-Covid Era.
It doesn’t mean that the Covid is over. It simply means that our lives have witnessed the ravage of this virus, and we are still here to talk about it.
Can we say we are in a Post-Naija era?
It doesn’t mean that there is no Nigeria any longer. It simply means that we have witnessed the ravage of this virus and we are still here to talk about it.
Now that all galleries, museums and cultural centers are closed.
Now that all galleries, museums and cultural centers are closed, the only option left to see…
The philosopher of sensiotics.
Henry Drewall, the philosopher of sensiotics, wrote a couple of days ago that, “Moyo mi owon — you have turned pain into paint…for us to see and feel….”
He should know. Sensiotics is the archeology of feelings within the human sensibility.
This painting shared here is about the pain and joy of departures and arrivals, as one of my Transatlantic Series: in 1992, I started it in Nigeria just as I was relocating to the to the United States, where I completed it.
SONG OF THE BANDIT 1: The Stupid Man
“Ina jin yunwa, Sule,” said the short, stocky man holding the cellphone.
“You are always hungry,” hissed the tall one. “Yaro will soon be back. Then you can eat yourself silly. I only need a cigarette. Really, really. bad. If I don’t have a smoke soon, walahi, I will kill this stupid man. He makes me jittery with his stupid coughing. If he coughs one more time, walahi, I will blow off his head.”
With his heavy boots, he delivered a severe kick to the fellow sitting on the ground. The blow caught the man in the ribs.
The three of them were directly under the shade of a large mango tree, its huge branches drooping from the weight of fruits hanging all the way from the top to the lowest branches.
OGUN ABIBIMAN
Artist: Moyo Okediji
Title: Wole Soyinka’s OGUN ABIBIMAN
Medium: acrylic on canvas
Date: 2018
Awam Amkpa
