By Japhet Alakam

THE contributions of Timothy Adebayo Fasuyi to the development of art in Nigeria will be brought to the fore as a group of artists, made up of those who have benefited from his award come together to celebrate him with an exhibition tagged Re- definition.

Timothy Adebayo Fasuyi is one of the names that comes to mind whenever arts and culture is discussed in Nigeria. He is a core art man, one of the first set of the Zaria Art school, worked in many art sectors and was federal art adviser who took over from late Professor Ben Enwonwu.

As a result of his love for art, as the federal art adviser, he established the Fasuyi prize for best graduating art student in tertiary institutions in the country to help art students, he also established Tafas Art gallery located in Akora Estate, off Adeniyi Jones Ikeja, Lagos in 1976, the first structure designed for art and culture, theatre, drama and dance. The Tafas gallery played its role then, in fact it was at the gallery that most of the plans for the FESTAC ’77 was done, but after some while the place was turned into other uses with the name The Resource Place.

After many years of absence of art activities in the place, the man is set to re open the place to its original focus, which is the promotion of artists and their works. And as part of activities to herald the re opening of the gallery, a special art exhibition tagged Re- definition, an exhibition of works of the pioneer founder, Fasuyi and five other artists especially beneficiaries of the Fasuyi prize like Ola Balogun, Bolaji Ogunwo, Greg Onyeka, Dudu Emmanuel etc is scheduled to hold at the place.

The exhibition which will feature over 40 works of paintings, sculpture and drawings will open on November, 23 and will run till December 7th, 2013. Some of the works to be displayed includes, Marriage vow, Shrine, Forest of demons,Sunset on child labour, Bushmeat on drier, Ifa by Fasuyi.

Briefing the press about the exhibition, Fasuyi who will be 80 next year said “the exhibition is to redefine the place as a cultural centre, it was originally built purposely for the promotion of art and culture by me in 1976, a year before the Festac 77, in fact some of the preparations for the Festac was done here.”

Continuing, he pointed out that, “apart from the exhibition, we are trying to bring together the artists who have won the Fasuyi prize, which I established when I was the Federal arts adviser, some of them have not met me, some of them are doing well, so its going to be a kind of re-union. We will also look look at the award and see how it has impacted on them.”

On his part, one of the organisers and exhibiting artist, Bolaji Ogunwo , a creative arts lecturer at University of Lagos stated, that they want to use the exhibition to acknowledge Fasuyi on how he has been able to impact positively on artists through his award and at the same time put the place to its original use. The Resource place according to him has been redefined for cultural and educational purposes which includes, art exhibitions, fashion shows, book launch, dance and drama rehearsals and performances.