The move was bananas… or maybe the work was just too ap-peal-ing. A Georgian-born American artist shook up the crowd at the Art Basel show in Miami Beach on Saturday when he grabbed a banana that had been duct-taped to a gallery wall and ate it.
Showing posts with label art. Show all posts
Showing posts with label art. Show all posts
Ivorian Joana Choumali becomes first African to win a prestigious photography award of $112,000 by using an iPhone.
Two Sisters Are Taking Makeup To The Next Level And Here Are Their 133 Most Stunning Transformations
Sibling rivalry often drives them to compete against each other in the same activities. However, it's quite rare to see siblings who, instead of competing, try to support each other. One of the amazing examples of it is two sisters, Charlotte and Abby Roberts, who both showcases their amazing talent for makeup.
This painting by a Nigerian artist Ben Enwonwu sold for a whopping $1.4m thanks to Google search
A painting by a Nigerian artist has been sold for $1.4 million at an auction in London after the family who owned it googled the signature and realised its importance.
Christine the name of the painting was created by the master of African modernism Ben Enwonwu in 1971.“The family were unaware of the significance of the painting or the importance of the artist until a chance “googling” of the signature led them to Sotheby’s free Online Estimate Platform,” said the London auction house. The painting precedes the artist’s 1974 work of Ife royal princess Adetutu “Tutu” Ademiluyi. That piece of work sold in 2018 for $1.6 million. Christine Elizabeth Davis, the subject and inspiration of the painting was born in New York, the stepdaughter of a renowned Ghanaian lawyer. According to auction house Sotheby’s, she moved back to Ghana to live with her stepfather in the early ’20s. She would soon relocate to Lagos in 1969 with her husband and developed a close friendship with the artist. The artwork is a product of a friendship between Christine, her husband, and Enwonsu, as well as her innate ability to stay composed and immobile for as long as the latter required for his loose brushstrokes and vibrant oil to capture her transient beauty. The portrayal of her long-neck, glowing skin, curved lips, and delicate smile is the testament of the warmth and grace of the sitter.
Who’s Ben Enwonwu?
Benedict Chukwukadibia Enwonwu was born a twin on July 14, 1917, in Onitsha, Anambra State, Nigeria. His father, Odigwe Emeka Enwonwu was a reputable traditional sculptor and his mother, Iyom, a successful cloth merchant. After his early education at Saint Mary’s School, Onitsha, Enwonwu enrolled at Government College, Ibadan in 1934, where his genius as an artist was greatly encouraged by Kenneth C. Murray, an Englishman, who was an education officer in charge of art education in the colonial civil service and later director of antiquities. He completed his secondary education at Government College, Umuahia in 1939. Murray in July 1937 exhibited the works of his students including Enwonwu at the Zwemmer Gallery in London. Enwonwu’s work was also shown at the Glasgow Empire Exhibition in 1938, and the following year, he was awarded prize money and a bronze medal for his work now in the art collection of the International Business Machine Corporation in San Francisco. In 1944, he was awarded a Shell Petroleum scholarship to study in the United Kingdom.
In England, he enrolled at the Goldsmith College of Art, Lewisham, London and later the Ruskin and Slade Ashmolean, Oxford, where he studied fine art, aesthetics, history of (Western) art and anthropology, graduating with first-class honours in sculpture. He continued his studies in London at the University College and the London School of Economics where he completed postgraduate work in social anthropology. On the invitation of Sir Julian Huxley then director of UNESCO in 1946, Enwonwu represented Africa at the International Exhibition of Modern Art held at the Musee D’Art Moderne in Paris. In 1947, he was elected Fellow of the Royal Anthropology Institute of Great Britain and Ireland (FRAI). He was also made a member of Hampstead Arts and Artists International. Enwonwu lectured widely in the United States including Harvard University and New York University. In recognition of his contributions to the advancement of art in Africa and the world, Ben Enwonwu was made a Member of the British Empire (MBE) in 1954. At the height of his fame in 1956, he was commissioned to sculpt a bronze portrait of Her Majesty, Queen Elizabeth II, making him the first African to be so honoured. The sittings began at the Buckingham Palace and the resulting full-length bronze statue was shown at the Tate Gallery. Enwonwu was also a member of the Royal Society of British Artists (RBA). His other major works include Anyanwu at the headquarters of the United Nations (UN) in New York, (Nigeria’s gift to the UN in promotion of world peace), Sango at the Power Holding Company of Nigeria (PHCN) headquarters in Lagos and The Drummer at the Nigerian Telecommunications headquarters (NITEL) in Lagos. Throughout his career, Enwonwu held several exhibitions in Nigeria and abroad and in 1991, a retrospective show spanning 50 years of creativity was held in his honour at the National Museum in Lagos. He died on February 5, 1994, at the age of 77.
Nelson Mandela’s Prison Art Fetches Over $112,000 at New York Auction.
African democracy icon and South Africa’s revered anti-apartheid campaigner, Nelson Mandela, maybe dead but his life continues to be celebrated across the world. From exhibitions on his life (in London), the unveiling of statues in his honour (at the United Nations Headquarters), the annual memorial lectures (back home in South Africa), the life of Madiba is almost constantly celebrated by the government.
Woman Thinks Grandma’s Old Painting Is Worth $250, but Appraiser Says It’s Way, Way, Way More.
When family members pass down heirlooms, it’s often difficult to discern just how valuable they are beyond their basic sentimental value. For one woman, a painting passed down from her grandmother was believed to be nothing more than that just an old but revered replica that had held special meaning to the grandmother over the course of her life.
Turning waste paper into art, Kenyan schoolchildren help to end global warming.
According to the United Nations Sustainable Development Goal, greenhouse gas emissions are at its highest level in history and it has resulted in changing weather patterns, rising sea levels and other extremities of the weather.
Harmonia Rosales Artist who received backlash for painting God as a black woman!
If you are familiar with Michelangelo’s masterpiece, “The Creation of Adam”, you would agree that it is one of the most famous works of art ever created. But when an Afro-Cuban, Chicago-based painter, Harmonia Rosales, painted her own version of Michelangelo’s work in 2017, reimagining God and the First Man as black women, she received a lot of backlashes.
Kevin Hart supports Nigeria-based artist by buying a trending pencil drawing of himself.
If you ever doubted the power of social media when it comes to showing off your talent, you should probably think again. There is no telling which big shot might be on your timeline and where it could get you.
This ‘painting’ is not what it appears to be.
Everyone loves a good optical illusion, and this time it’s a work of art that looks a lot like a painting but isn’t one. This video that’s going viral on Twitter and Instagram, looks like a painting of a man’s face on a canvas, but is actually a piece of ‘sculptural assemblages’.
Sick vandals smear white paint over WWII RAF memorial to fallen airmen.
Sick vandals have smeared white paint over a World War Two memorial dedicated to soldiers who lost their lives while serving in the RAF. The Bomber Command Memorial in London's Green Park was damaged overnight, leaving paint across the eight figures of soldiers, the plinth engraved with a tribute and the floor bronze sculpture, dedicated to the 55,573 men of Bomber Command who never came home has been defaced at least four times since it was opened by the Queen in 2012.
Matthew Bourne's Swan Lake, Sadler's Wells, review: an All-male reinvention of the world’s favorite ballet is still a marvel.
Swan Lake with male swans: Matthew Bourne’s reinvention of the world’s favourite ballet is still a marvel. For this revival, he and regular collaborators Lez Brotherston and Paule Constable have refreshed their staging, but the shape and the urgency of Bourne’s storytelling continue to sing out. This is a Swan Lake that taps into the power of the classic the yearning for love, for freedom while finding its own spellbinding imagery.
Desmond Blair Paints Amazing Masterpieces, But People Don’t Believe Him When They See His Hands.
We’ve heard quite a lots of stories about people overcoming their ordeals and seemingly unpalatable circumstances, creating something amazing out of it. Desmond Blair’s story might be one of the most colourful ones we’ve heard in recent times.
Nigerian visual artist Njideka Akunyili Crosby gets her works auctioned for 3.4 million dollars in the UK.
Stephen Wiltshire the human camera: autistic artist draws city skylines from memory.
Diagnosed with autism at age three, Stephen Wiltshire is now famous for producing highly detailed scenes after just a brief glance.Today, Stephen Wiltshire is one of Britain’s best-known artists. His commissions have a four to eight month waiting list, and videos of him sketching panoramic city scapes in perfect scale have a tendency to go viral.
‘Fearless Girl’ is heading to Europe.
“Fearless Girl” is bullish on travel. The Lower Manhattan statue of a young girl with her fists on her hips in a defiant display of resilience will cross the pond to visit Dublin and London. The statue, which was created by sculptor Kristen Visbal, will first make a stop next month in Ireland, appearing at Europe’s Climate Innovation Summit at Dublin Castle from Nov. 6-8.
The ULTIMATE Millionaires Row worth £93MILLION.
A tiny millionaires' playground has knocked the likes of Miami and Monte Carlo off their mantles to become the most expensive stretch of the coastal real estate in the world. An 850ft stretch of road in one the UK's most exclusive enclaves, Sandbanks, contains just 13 harbourside mansions that total a staggering £93 million in value.
STREET CHALK ART BY DAVID ZINN
David Zinn has been creating original artwork in and around Ann Arbor, Michigan since 1987. For more than twenty years, he freelanced for a wide variety of commercial clients while simultaneously sneaking “pointless” art into the world at large.
North Korea's human LED animated screen made up of thousands of children is just remarkable.
North Korea may have a reputation as one of the bleakest countries on earth but there is no denying it can splash the colour if it needs to impress.
David Hockney painting is expected to fetch $80m and set the record for a living artist.
ONE OF DAVID Hockney’s famous “pool paintings” is coming to auction and is expected to sell in the million range, easily breaking the record for a work by a living artist sold at auction. The British artist’s Portrait of an Artist (Pool with Two Figures), to be auctioned at Christie’s in November, is considered one of his premier works.
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