By Efe Onodjae

Reasserting the presence, complexity and creative sovereignty of Black identity in contemporary visual art, O’DA Art Gallery, Victoria Island, Lagos, is currently hosting a powerful group exhibition titled Black Figuration Is Alive and Well.

The exhibition, which opened on Sunday, July 13, 2025, is still ongoing and is scheduled to close on Saturday, August 9, 2025.

Coming at a time when the relevance of Black portraiture is increasingly questioned in global discourse, the show delivers a vibrant and unambiguous response: our faces, our stories, and our visions matter now more than ever.

The exhibition features an impressive array of artists: Reuben Ugbine and Djakou Kassi Nathalie, who are reinvigorating African sculpture through themes of spirituality, heritage, and surreal forms.
Mobolaji Ogunrosoye, Orry Studio, and Lakin Ogunbanwo, whose works in photography and collage explore memory, beauty, and layered identity.

Anthony Nsofor, Isaac Emokpae, and Joseph Ogbeide, who deploy linework and abstraction to reflect on ancestry, family, and cultural preservation.

Soji Adesina, Chika Idu, and Olajide Ajayi (LA Draws), delving into Afro-surrealism to interrogate dreams, diasporic memory, and technology.

Taiye Idahor and Stephen Price, presenting emotionally textured works on freedom, femininity, and inherited memory.
Simon Ojeaga, whose rhythmic “fractellations” evoke the meditative and emotional quality of Yinka Bernie’s soulful soundscapes.

Opeyemi Olukotun, offering poignant realist portraits that celebrate everyday Black life with dignity and empathy.
Together, these artists underscore that Black figuration is anything but static or reductive. Instead, it is expansive, experimental, and urgent, a dynamic force for cultural commentary and self-affirmation.

Speaking on the curatorial direction, Obida Obioha, Gallery Director and curator of the show, remarked:

“The ongoing prominence of figuration in Black and African art stands not as aesthetic repetition, but as an urgent political and cultural gesture, a reclaiming of presence, history, and imaginative sovereignty.”