Emerging Artist Series
A quarterly incubation programme supporting young and emerging artists in Northern Nigeria to develop their practice, create new works and gain greater visibility.
About the series
Each edition combines one-on-one mentorship with an established artist, practical support, funding, professional development and a public exhibition, giving artists space to move their work from ideas to presentation.
Each edition selects one emerging artist to participate in a period of development and mentorship, culminating in an exhibition and public engagement programme at Open Arts Space. Through the series, artists receive feedback on their practice, opportunities to connect with the wider arts community, and greater exposure to audiences, collectors and potential collaborators.
Context
Northern Nigeria has a growing community of artists developing ambitious and diverse practices, but many have limited access to mentorship, exhibition opportunities, professional networks and pathways into the art market.
The Emerging Artist Series responds to these gaps by creating a supportive environment where artists can develop their work, exchange ideas and build relationships with peers, audiences and established practitioners.
The artists
Abdulfatai Abdulgafar
Artist
Rahma Azeez
Artist
Taslimah Woli
Photographer
Featured Exhibition
Residues
Paintings by Abdulfatai Abdulgafar
War is a universal language. Servitude as well. Serving one’s country is a universally acknowledged act of glory. Of sacrifice. But the service goes beyond war. It lives on, in the silence of bedrooms in the evenings, in the crackle of long distance phone calls, in the bare feet of children in a barrack. In the pictures of a soldier carrying his wounded self home, of wrapped bodies and mourning families.
For the children of soldiers, service is a constant presence. One that shadowed birthdays, swallowed Eids, and stained childhoods in military camouflage.
This exhibition is titled Residues not because it documents the intricacies of military life, but because it seeks to explore what is left behind. As the son of a soldier, and a child who grew up within the walls of military barracks, Abdulgafar knows these residues intimately. He has seen them. He has been them.
Abdulgafar’s paintings do not strive for realism. Instead, they explore the pieces of what lingers, the emotional residue of a life shaped by sacrifice and survival. Through thick, textured, tactile palette work, he creates images that carry both weight and emotion, expressing joy, ache, and the quiet burden borne by many.
These works are not about the battlefield. They are about what echoes after it:
A soldier lost in war.
A mother holding onto a child whose smile is as wide as the moon.
A father who may never return.
A son who waits, and waits, and grows up to understand what service does to a man, and to those who love him.
This exhibition does not ask you to look at war. It asks you to look at the complexity of military service itself. It says service goes beyond war, skirmishes or death. It looks at what is left behind in the line of duty: the debris of devotion and the lingering residues of sacrifice.