Women Artists

"Another motivating factor was when Professor Solomon Irein Wangboje came to my college and selected the best painting for the cover of his book, ‘Art for Secondary schools’. I was really elated and inspired to see my art on the front cover of a book used by the entire school. When I finally opted to study fine arts, my parents were not excited at all. Even my mother who was an artist told me art was not recognised in Nigeria and that if I wanted to be successful, it was better to study some other course like law. They felt I could do something more ‘prestigious’ and more acceptable in the Nigeria of that time. I insisted because I believed I had enough passion and skill to forge ahead. However they gave me full support while I was in school. I received the best student prize at the University of Benin, the same prize she had received ten years before. My artistic project during the National Youth Service earned me a national award. By this time, I didn’t need a soothsayer to tell me I was on the right path."

"My interest in art derived from the great influences that Benin art, culture, festivals and history presented growing up in the city. My mother also had a strong influence on me. I not only learnt art from her at home, she was also my art teacher at the Federal Government Girls’ College, Benin. My principal, Josephine Ifueko Omigie, was an art graduate of Ahmadu Bello University, Zaria. The cultural events organised by the school helped stimulate interest in arts and culture. We had an annual week-long competition on cultural activities that engaged every student in one creative activity or the other. I was also a member of the school choir and played the piano."

"But the Federal Government has not looked in that direction; I think that the grants should be given across board."

"So we have these artifacts standing in our stead and showing that we had a very rich tradition that is enviable."

"And the fact that Nigeria is world acclaimed for arts because of the artifacts that were stolen in the 19th century and taken away to different parts of the world."

"For example, the visual arts which is my own forte, has been totally ignored in Nigeria."

"Nollywood is very well known and I think because of the acclaim it has beyond Nigeria; it has drawn a lot of attention, but there are a lot of other areas that are being ignored."

"It needs to be rewarded; you don’t come watch a play and then just go away without putting something down; we need to get grants for artists, we need to support them."

"People do not recognise that there’s a lot of talent; a lot of energy that go into putting up a production."

"People producing arts, all along the roads, on the streets; everywhere and you begin to know that this is a city of Art."

"Government has to give grant and also individuals have to do that as well, so that the art industry grows because there are so many talented people in this country and I think they need to be encouraged."

"Funding is a major issue for every artist; people want to watch a good play; people want to get entertained and they don’t want to pay for it."

"If education should be salvaged in this country we cannot leave it to the government alone. There has to be an inclusion of the private sector."

"First of all, it is one thing to identify a problem. Secondly, it is another to have the power to effect those changes. Poor funding of universities is a key problem. It also seems to me that there is an unspoken practice of privileging the sciences over the humanities."

"There are several challenges facing education generally in Nigeria. There has been a steady decline in standards in the visual arts, as in other disciplines. Today, there are very poor facilities for teaching art in almost all art schools in Nigeria."

"I'm always scared when I think that man who is a being endowed with abilities of reflection, is not capable of solving their personal or collective disputes without violence."

"How to create works of art when nothing connects people to the world? If the artist remains fixed from himself to himself, without any distance in which a relationship to the world and to the other can be inscribed, his work will remain sterile as in the Greek myth of Hesiod's genesis, and is in no way different from any other object."

"Were all other monuments swept away from the face of Hindustan, were all its inhabitants destroyed, and its name forgotten, the existence of the Sanskrit language would prove that it once contained a race who had reached a high degree of refinement, and who must have been blessed with many rare advantages before such a language could have been formed and polished. Amidst the wreck of nations where it flourished, and superior to the havoc of war and conquest, it remains a venerable monument of the splendour of other times, as the solid Pyramid in the deserts of Egypt.""

"A stranger in India will not fail to be struck with the indiscriminate respect which the lower classes of Hindus pay to the objects worshipped by all other sects. I have seen them making their little offerings, and joining the processions at the Mussulman feasts of Hassan and Hossein, and as frequently appearing at the doors of the Romish Portuguese chapels, with presents of candles to burn before the saints, and flowers to adorn the shrines; in short, whatever is regarded as holy by others, they approach with reverence, so much are uncultivated men the creatures of imitation and habit."

"The Hindus claim the honour of having invented the method of teaching by apologues…"

"Everywhere in the ancient Hindu books we find the maxims of that pure and sound morality which is founded on the nature of man as a rational and social being…."

"In short, I consider morality like the sciences and arts, to be only slumbering not forgotten in India; and that to awaken the Hindus to a knowledge of the treasures in their own hands is the only thing wanting to set them fairly in the course of improvement with other nations."

"Art is about man's belonging to the world and it is through art that man, through aesthetic emotion, experiences awareness of his existence. The artist grasps the world, and the world that appears to us in fractions he restores to us in unity."

"The beauty in a work of art is not in the prettiness of what is represented, but emanates from the work as a whole, it is its substrate and it derives from nature."

"Our missionaries are very apt to split upon this rock, and in order to place our religion in the brightest light, as if it wanted their feeble aid, they lay claim exclusively to all the sublime maxims of morality and tell those they wish to convert, that their own books contain nothing but abominations, the belief of which they must abandon in order to receive the purer doctrine of Christianity. Mistaken men! Mistaken men! Could they desire a better opening to their hopes than to find already established that morality which says, it is enjoined to man even at the moment of destruction to wish to benefit his foes, ‘as the sandal tree in the instant of its overthrow sheds perfume on the axe that fells it.’…"

"…perhaps I should be ashamed to own that I had so far strayed from good-nature and good-sense, as to forget, that whatever reproaches may be deserved by some of the Hindus for their moral practices the fundamental principles of morality itself are so firmly implanted in the soul of man that no vicious practice and no mistaken code can change their nature..."

"My work looks to indigenous fruit, aesthetics and beliefs from the Global South, where conquerors literally carried seeds of wealth. I aspire to give shape to the possibilities of blackness by creating space for self-reflection"

"We have animation studios in Africa, but I am yet to see anybody that can say I am an independent animation studio owner. We are trying to see that animations are well generated in Africa. We want a platform where young people can dialogue and be part of the game."

"I already knew what I wanted to be at the age of seven, but there was no capacity for it here. But I was able to achieve my dream"

"Animation can be used to tell stories. My film, The Legacy of Rubies, which won Best Animation at AMAA, tells a story and to make these young ones know that they can do it too. All we need is the capacities to be established."

"Ângela Ferreira occupies a special position in the history of artistic approaches to archival practices. One of the pioneers of research-based strategies at the very beginning of the 1990s—before these strategies had a name and long before they became a widespread (sometimes jaded) paradigm—the artist also applied her archival impulse as a new critical tool for sculpture, rooted in expanded and ethnographic procedures. But what marks Ferreira out in the contemporary art world is that her work often concerns the region of sub-Saharan Africa and, more specifically, South African and Mozambican realities inflicted by the troubled history of colonization, post-colonization, and apartheid."

"I realized that choosing a building or any kind of built structure immediately gave me a righteousness of place. Architecture rooted the work in the place and had an amazing other quality, which is that, particularly with public buildings, everybody knows them; they belong to everybody in the city."

"I think it’s time to start looking at these buildings as African architecture and no longer putting these tags of Modern architecture from colonial times. Of course, you will never take that history away, but they’ve now belonged to the people that are living in them for much longer than they did during colonial times and so they should be seen as African architecture."

"I never did believe in miracles, But I've a feeling it's time to try. I never did believe in the ways of magic, But I'm beginning to wonder why."

"Birds have always been my companions. I am a very lonely person. They are the only real friends that I have had. Sometimes I think I should have been a bird. I even paint like a bird. You will notice that all my landscapes are done from a bird’s view, high up and far away."

"The best musician anyone could have in their band and the best friend anyone could have in their life"

"I’m good at pathos. I write about romantic despair a lot. That’s my thing, but with a positive spin"

"Not many bands have had the same longevity; there is life in the old girl yet. It’s about finding new inspiration and enjoyment for each other. As long as we have that we’ll keep going"

"Maybe people want to see us because they think it’s the last chance. We’re a young band at heart; you’d never think we are the age we are. We’re never static. It’s going to be fantastic"

"To be honest. That came from my parents. I can’t imagine better advice coming from one’s parents. I try to stick by that rule and to be as good a person as I can"

"We all sensed that perhaps Lindsey would leave first. I mean, the very thought of one band member leaving was catastrophic to us, because we all felt that each one of us was irreplaceable"

"I think there’s always a certain amount of romance on our records, I mean, you know, that’s ‘cause I’m writing some of the songs, I always write about romance"

"That’s the- another thing is, you know, the pressure is on you when you’re doing a solo record, when you come together with, you know, four tried and trusted other musicians you feel like you’ve got a very strong shoulder to lean on that’s not about to collapse under you, you know"

"I think that actually that releases the emotional tension to be honest with you. I always think that, no matter what’s gone on prior to the, you know, treading the boards at night, I think we all kind of leave that behind when we’re on stage and you tend to even put more feeling into the songs I think"

"Can you hear me calling Out your name? You know that I'm falling And I don't know what to say I'll speak a little louder I'll even shout You know that I'm proud And I can't get the words out Oh, I I want to be with you everywhere."

"If you wake up and don't want to smile, If it takes just a little while, Open your eyes and look at the day. You'll see things in a different way.Don't stop, thinking about tomorrow, Don't stop, it'll soon be here. It'll be, better than before. Yesterday's gone, yesterday's gone."

"But of course she is also known for her landscapes. Her practice was quite contentious in terms of the subject. Many critics argued that it was influenced by the white people she was in contact with, for instance her gallerist. For me, there is something very exciting about her imagery of birds and landscapes."

"“I was brought up in the British colonial type of painting, which I deplored. I had to do the little butterflies, the little flowers, and the little this and the little that in watercolors.”"

"With an incredible knack for identifying and nurturing artistic talent, Helen regularly imparted her invaluable visual arts skills to many artists, assisting them to blossom into top-notch creatives. With the death of Helen, Zimbabwe has lost an exceptionally talented practitioner and arts administrator who contributed to the growth and development of the visual arts by putting the sector on the world’s artistic map. May her soul Rest In Peace."

"Bulawayo, I am from Bulawayo, the second city of Zimbabwe. On a return to Home, I found, saw, so many people wearing the black patch of mourning attached to their shirts. I knew what the patch meant and for whom it was worn; a generation decimated by AIDS and parents burying their children. It was with profound grief that I created HOME."