Public Vote

The Public Vote Prize of US$2,000 is awarded to the artist whose artwork receives the most votes from the viewing public, either in person at the exhibition or through the online gallery.

Click here to vote now.

Addis Gezehagn: Floating City XXXVI

Addis Gezehagn is known for his labour-intensive assemblage practice. Methodically layering cut-outs from locally sourced magazines onto his canvases, the artist then applies acrylic paint to create his signature cityscapes. His canvases possess a kaleidoscopic quality, every centimetre of each painting different from the last. The effect is a dizzying landscape of colour variations and unique textures, created by the intentional cracking of the collage beneath. There is a tension that permeates Gezehagn’s work, as the artist subtly hints at the social consequences of the incessant desire to urbanise. While impoverished communities in Addis Ababa once lived in ground-level shacks, they are now being uprooted to reside in newly built highrise buildings. Gezehagn’s paintings are more than just a snapshot of the city rather, they stand as a visual archive of what will soon be lost to the relentless pursuit of modernity.

Adébayo Bolaji: The Skirt

My work is not literal, I like to play with Symbols. 'The Skirt' acts as a metaphore for 'a covering'. In this case one is encouraged to ponder ideas about identity through clothing. More so, how we choose to engage with ourselves and the rest of the world via culture. Culture is a language, and in language we experience the voice and the identity of oneself or a group. If we look closer we find that culture is really communicating ideas and a need for self preservation. The bold use of the colour red is to give more weight to this importance of language, culture and symbols through this one symbolic skirt.

Afi Nayo: From The Sky

I sat in front of this large window open to nature in the south of France, looking out at a vast lavender field, and I painted this picture which, to me, represents night and day. Our world, sometimes dark but not so dark after all, plays with reflections,
shadows, and reliefs. The sky, the whirlwinds, the dance, the enigma, the mysteries of the indigo night, and suddenly, the day appears in its well of light, bringing the enchantment of seeing a flower bloom, a color in the sky, and realizing the incredible fortune of living in this present moment. This painting, 'From the Sky,' represents the mystery of life and the magic of possible moments.

Alioune Diouf: The Egg of the Spirit #2

In 1989, Alioune Diouf met the artist and philosopher Issa Samb (alias Joe Oukam), an emblematic figure of the Senegalese art scene and of the Laboratoire Agit' Art (a historical artist's collective), who invited him to join the famous courtyard of 17 Jules Ferry, where he resided for 28 years. This work composed of two drawings that evoke human or zoomorphic figures, intertwined individuals, surrounded by cosmic and floral elements. Inspired by the different philosophies of West Africa, most notably the Serer philosophy, they convey a spiritual and sacred symbolism, an interconnection amongst all living beings.

Amine El Gotaibi: Until The Light Emerges

In 'Until the Light Emerges,' the artist polishes oxidised steel until light emerges from the burnt material, creating a mirror-like surface. This reflective light symbolises Africa's organic riches and energy. By using reflection, the artist shows abundance and light emerging from nature and challenges viewers through their reflection in the work. Engaging viewers with their reflections emphasises the individual's role in changing perspectives for the future. Reflection is realised literally through the materials. The artist's ongoing projects like 'Illuminate The Light,' 'Visit Okavango,' and 'Sun (W)hole' in Nirox South Africa continue to shift global views of his beloved continent. For the artist, art serves as a collective platform for altering world views, offering provocation and hope for a new world order, and demonstrating the sophistication of African artists and their native countries.

Chukwudubem Ukaigwe: Konstant K / Hymn for T.A. / Blues 7

This painting calls on migrational archives to perform in the present. Citing the Windrush era; a period of diasporic movement from the Caribbean to the occidental west, characterized as the first 'willful' case history of mass migration across the Atlantic - this work maps out fragments of quotidian Black life from archival documents like Botanical inventories, newspapers, journals, and statistical documents. Deploying the compositional sensibility of repetition from black musical traditions, the artist orchestrates a system of alternating formal changes in colour, shape, and placement to fabulate a generative conception of the rhythmic ordinary as well as propose a mapping of differential paths or fates of travelling ancestors. The use of patterns and re-patterning is also evocative of diasporic African quilting practices, as well as African fabric and architectural architecture.

Collin Sekajugo: Act Of Justice

This is a mixed media artwork that was inspired by one of Nelson Mandela’s famous speeches. This artwork is part of a series of works that I’m currently working on, where I explore the nuances surrounding an ideal 21st century boy child versus famous personalities that he may look up to as role models.

DuduBloom More: Contending With Control

Contending With Control is an evocative representation between methodical control and the unpredictability of personal discovery. The act of hand stitching, with its rhythmic and precise movements, offers a therapeutic escape, a controlled environment. Yet, stitching a circle, a shape without a beginning or end, symbolises the repetitive nature of existential questioning. Despite varying the details, the patterns remain unending. The monotone ivory hue chosen for this work signifies an acknowledgment of the ambiguity and uncertainty that accompanies the journey of self-rediscovery. It invites contemplation and acceptance of the unknown answers that lie ahead. Using wool, a material that is both strong and familiar, highlights a grounding force amidst this introspective process. The tactile experience of working with wool through a neutral, lulling headspace speaks to the desire to transcend the monochromatic and reach the vibrant realisation of one’s purpose and existence.

Eva Obodo: Yellow Sisi Hooked Up

Yellow Sisi Hooked Up (2024) is a reflection on the internet-driven lives of modern youth. The artwork is configured with brilliantly colored cloths and threads, each hue radiating the allure of the digital world. The composition's cylindrical forms, meticulously rolled, wrapped, bound, and sewn, are under palpable strain, symbolizing the relentless grip of social media and internet addiction. These forms, tightly constrained, metaphorically represent the obsessive pursuit of online pleasure that pervades contemporary youth culture. The tension in the materials mirrors the psychological pressure faced by young individuals, torn between the demands of real life and the escapist lure of their screens. Through this vivid, tactile depiction, Yellow Sisi Hooked Up invites viewers to reflect on the cost of constant connectivity and the fragmented reality of a generation ensnared by the very technology that promises freedom and connection.

Gerald Chukwuma: Here and There

Black and white, elu n’ala, gold it seems, but blue filters from within. How we live, who we are. While we breathe, wings dance around. We are a part of a whole and a whole of a part. In the silent moments between breaths, we exist in two realms. Our bodies tread the physical world, grounded and tangible. Yet, our spirits soar in a dimension unseen, where our essence intertwines with the universe. We walk through life, often unaware of our dual nature. Each step in the material world echoes in the spiritual, and each echo in the spirit world influences the material. Unseen wings flutter around us, guiding and shaping our path, blending the gold of our aspirations with the blue of our emotions. In this dance of duality, we find our place as both finite and infinite, shaping a reality where we navigate between bound and

Malaika Temba: Sweet Disposition

Jacquard woven fabric, acrylic paint Textiles, with their
inherent beauty, become a canvas for critiquing
gendered concepts of softness and domesticity. I
interrogate the roles of women as nurturers,
acknowledging the responsibility, time, and patience
demanded by traditional gender roles. Through this
exploration, my work celebrates the labor inherent in
textiles, inviting reflection on the complexities of identity,
culture, and tradition.

Ibrahim Ballo: Madame la Patronne

Ballo's intricate work mixing cotton embroidery and weaving and acrylic paint expresses here its ingenuity. The work on textures and colours, on layers, perspectives, abstractions and figurations sprinkled with symbolism materialises here a tale of humanity linked to the living and the invisible and this idea of a deep and strong connection between what lies within and the universe. Whether it is beauty, hope, imagination, thoughts or emotions, it blooms, spreads and interacts with the physical and spiritual worlds. 'It reflects on my practices, in art, carrying a legacy from the tradition of weaving in my region in Mali to the canvases where I express my views on our societies and advocate for an open-minded world where if not mixing and appreciate we will accept other cultures, customs and people, live together, care, for a better future... People I see, I interact with or imagine. From Within to the universe'.

Gadi Ramadhani: If I Knew | Laiti Ningejua

'This figurative painting reflects on marriage and society in Tanzania, and I hope it resonates across Africa and globally. It explores women's expectations in marriage—dreams and fantasies—versus the stark reality, revealing marriage as an empty box requiring mutual effort to fill. Using marriage as a metaphor, I address leadership, family negotiations, and Africa's broader struggles. The colors blue, grey, and brown symbolize land, sky, and global context. I use charcoal to represent Tanzania's geographical and cultural essence and the experience of being a black African. Titled "If I Knew" (Swahili: "Laiti Ningejua"), the work explores doubts and realizations post-decision. The octopus symbolizes the male figure and represents the limited fulfillment of social contracts. Through this painting, I aim to depict the complexities of negotiations and subsequent disillusionment.

Hako Hankson: Commitment Day

'Hako Hankson's work is a true ode to the past and myths of ancient African civilizations. The artist transcribes, with legitimacy, the history of ancestral rites by giving them a contemporary resonance. He grew up surrounded by distant beliefs, lulled by songs, a dialect, a poet in the manner of Homer, Hako Hankson's frescoes substitute for the spoken word and have a real didactic function. Skirting the fine line between profane and sacred, it is a rare world that is made
accessible to the greatest number. These open windows on the past are reminders to allow the actors of the present not to commit past mistakes.

Marcellina Akpojotor: Isedua's Song

Working from photos from my personal archive, this work explores themes of identity and everyday life through the portrait of my mother. The figure is adorned in a blue patterned blouse and seated at the dining table, surrounded by symbols of beauty, growth, faith, and strength, which contrast the framed image of a storm on the wall. This juxtaposition brings tension to the work, suggesting the obstacles that one encounters in life. With "Isedua's Song", I aim to capture the complexities of women's experiences and the ways in which they navigate life's challenges. Using waste Ankara fabrics, I create intricate, textured layerings that symbolize the complexity of
the human experience. Through this piece, I celebrate the resilience and beauty of women's lives.

Mikhael Subotzky: The Porterville Galleon

I began my career as a photographer in 2004, documenting the world around me and seeking to understand the socio-political context into which I was born. I have long been fascinated with ships, from matchstick prison-art photographed during my first body of work in Pollsmoor prison, to an abiding fascination with this image, a four-masted Dutch ship painted by an indigenous person on a rock face near present-day Porterville, South Africa. It is thought this painting depicts the offshore spring near Saldanha Bay where colonial ships would send a man down in a rowboat with a cup to taste the seawater until they hit the spot where it was salt-free. If it’s true this artist was rendering this strange ritual, it’s nice to think of them as a proto-documentarian surveilling the colonisers before they had a chance to inflict their return gaze as a part of their project of dispossession.

Modupeola Fadugba: Portrait of an Artist at Ease

Portrait of an Artist at Ease by Modupeola
Fadugba commemorates her decade-long journey as an artist. Created using acrylic on canvas and inspired by David Hockney, Fadugba reinterprets classic influences through a contemporary lens. The artwork features a striking interplay of dark and golden hues, with the artist emerging ethereally from a black background. The use of gold and black creates a sense of mystery and revelation as if the artist is part of the darkness yet breaking free. The texture and fluidity of the paint suggest dynamic presence and creative energy. The subject appears relaxed and confident, embodying an artist who has found her rhythm and voice. This portrayal celebrates Fadugba’s milestones and the journey of artistic self-discovery and mastery. By drawing inspiration from Hockney, Fadugba bridges past and present, tradition and innovation, showcasing art's enduring power to capture the complexities of human experience.

Nandipha Mntambo: The Beloved V

The term 'Chimera' has come to describe any mythical or fictional creature with parts taken from various animals, to describe anything composed of disparate parts or perceived as wildly imaginative, implausible, or dazzling. According to Greek mythology the Chimera was a fire-breathing hybrid creature depicted as a lion with the head of a goat protruding from its back and a tail that ends with a head of a snake. This focus on painting, under the title 'Chimera' follows my passion for a multidisciplinary artistic practice, explores form, material and illusion. Creating immersive large scale works with the hope of drawing a viewer into the world of my creative process. Playing with the oppositions of desire and repulsion, invitation and warning.

Ozioma Onuzulike: Embroidered Babariga Armour for Fubara (Power Series)

This ceramic tapestry, a testament to my reverence for craft tradition, has been constructed from 3,189 handcrafted clay palm kernel shell beads woven together using copper wire to resemble a sumptuous West African elite gown called “Babariga” or “Agbada”. The shells were bisque-fired, then selectively dipped into glazes before being inlaid with glass from crushed recycled bottles and re-fired to very high temperatures. This laborious studio process made the shells take after glass beads, historically used as tokens to buy enslaved people. But beads are now considered prestige items and emblems of high social status in much of West Africa. Produced at the height of the struggle for political power between the governor of the oil-rich Rivers State in Nigeria and his political godfather, this piece brings to mind both “agbada” dress (emblematic of the affluence of political figures) and the medieval plate-armour and speaks to political turmoil in Africa.

Patrick Tagoe-Turkson: Ghananyi Anamon

This artwork is a striking composition made of repurposed flip-flops, predominantly in square and rectangular black shapes intermingled with various brown tones. The arrangement gives the idea of a settlement from a bird's-eye perspective, generating a feeling of order and organic randomness. A single, complete red flip-flop, noticeably without its strap, emerges from the piece's lower edge and extends towards the viewer, pulling the eye and connecting the artwork to the observer's area. The flip-flops, recovered from Ghana's beaches, represent both the environmental impact of human activity and the dynamic, tenacious character of the communities that live along these coasts.

Shabu Mwangi: Loathing in silence (II)

In creating this painting, Loathing in Silence, I was reflecting on times when the action of serving others builds a void and a feeling of loss which can becomes overwhelming and create a state of loathing.
During the making of this painting, I was thinking deeply about my society and how we can get emotionally trapped, commiserating with others and begin to feel drained by too much introspection. In this state, we can get trapped taking care of others and lose sight of ourselves.
Does it really matter here, commenting on wellbeing when for sure What is in the absence of the mind intellect leads to self-abnegation.

Yannick Ackah: La fête rose

Ackah's multi-layered painting is a journey through continents and times: With his mask motifs, he spans an arc from his African origins to the reception of Africa by Picasso and Parisian modernism, to Jean-Michel Basquiat and the New York graffiti scene of the 1980s. Various materials such as paper, newspaper and magazine articles or fabric, which he assembles in a collage-like manner in his works, create the typical surface structure, using the motif of the mask as the central pictorial element. They
contribute to the three-dimensionality and depth of his works, adding a dimension of everyday and popular culture that the artist
playfully combines with traditional motifs.

Simphiwe Buthelezi: I Swallowed the Ground

‘I Swallowed the Ground’ is a captivating sculpture that combines treated reed mats, meticulously cut and arranged into a spherical shape reminiscent of a planet. Within this textured sphere, cavities and craters emerge, filled with glass beads and stones that spill onto the surface. Positioned beneath the sculpture are circular magnifying glass pieces and a spoon, inviting viewers to take a closer look. By subverting the common idiom “Wish the ground would swallow me up” the artwork delves into themes of planetary sustenance and equilibrium. It’s a thought-provoking exploration of our relationship with the Earth and the delicate balance we must maintain. It prompts us to consider what sustains us and what we, in turn, consume. The magnifying glass encourages closer examination. Viewers can explore the intricate details, akin to how we scrutinize our impact on the environment.

Yacine Tilala Fall: Canopic Inquiry I (sea of belly)

Canopic Inquiry I (sea of belly) is a merge of metal casting, ceramic, and curing processes within one form. Seated in a preserved cow stomach, this object inverts the traditional use of Egyptian canopic jars, with organs holding a vessel rather than being held. The negotiation of fragility and meditations on Duamutef 'the guardian of the stomach' bring up the question of time and what binds an object to the living, the dead, or both?

Yadichinma Ukoha-Kalu: Familiar Territory (Diptych)

'Familiar Territory' is a body of work where I explore the concept of speculative cartography, crafting imaginative landscapes that delve into alternative narratives specific to ancient Igbo land. My exploration is grounded in a seven-week research period during a residency program in Dakar, Senegal, where I immersed myself in Igbo cosmology, architecture, symbols, and mythology. During this residency, I extensively studied and collected symbols, which form the basis of my speculative maps. These symbols are infused with meanings derived from Igbo cultural heritage, offering a reinterpretation through the lens of speculative cartography. Additionally, I incorporate fabric as a symbolic element to represent the enduring use of textiles as vessels of stories throughout history. These fabrics are woven in Senegal by indigenous Senegalese weavers, adding a tactile and cultural layer to my exploration.

Public Vote

The Public Vote Prize of US$2,000 is awarded to the artist whose artwork receives the most votes from the viewing public, either in person at the exhibition or through the online gallery. ​ Click here to vote now.

The Public Vote Prize of US$2,000 is awarded to the artist whose artwork receives the most votes from the viewing public, either in person at the exhibition or through the online gallery.

Click here to vote now.