One thing you should know is that the African contemporary art scene is doing extremely well. As African artists are becoming increasingly recognized for their talent. With the number of prestigious exhibitions and art fairs in which these artists have participated in recent years, it is clear that the world wants to hear what African artists have to say. To understand their stories, and to relate to their themes of identity, individuality, and the liminal spaces they occupy through their various mediums of choice. Portraiture is an important genre in contemporary art. It serves as a function of representation – an individual’s appearance or personality, or both. It is also important for contemporary art that a portrait contains context, identity questions, and social issues.
African contemporary portrait artists have found their way into international art spaces with Kehinde Wiley and Amy Sherald creating portraits of Barack Obama and Michelle Obama in 2018. There are a host of other artists honing that art genre. Here is a list of contemporary African artists you should know.
Zanele Muholi
Image courtesy of Lens culture
Zanele Muholi (b. 1972) is a South African visual activist and photographer. For over a decade they have documented black lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender and intersex people’s lives in different townships in South Africa. Zanele Muholi’s direct, striking and thought-provoking imagery has won them praise and recognition on a global scale. The artist uses their own body as a canvas to question negative stereotypes and conventional methods of representation.
Their work with the “Hail the Dark Lioness” series was to encourage people in the LGBTQ+ community to be brave enough to occupy spaces.
Muholi has won numerous awards including the ICP Infinity Award for Documentary and Photojournalism (2016), Africa’Sout! Courage and Creativity Award (2016) and the Outstanding International Alumni Award from Ryerson University (2016), amongst others.
Image courtesy of Lens Culture
Follow Zanele Muholi and their work here.
Njideka Akunyili-Crosby
Nigerian visual artist, Njideka Akunyili Crosby (b. 1983) utilizes collage and photo transfer techniques to negotiate the cultural landscape between her chosen home in America and her native heritage Nigeria. She makes paintings that reflect her experience with cultural hybridity which is a major theme in her work.
Her dense, vibrant portraits combine images from fashion magazines, photographs of Nigerian pop stars, and selections from the artist’s own family photo albums to create intimate domestic scenes.
Her works have been exhibited in prestigious institutions like the Whitney Museum, MOCA Los Angeles, the Studio Museum in Harlem, and the National Portrait Gallery in London.
Image courtesy of the artist’s instagram
Represented by Victoria Miro and David Zwirner, you can follow Njideka Akunyili Crosby and their work here.
Amaoko Boafo
Amoako Boafo (b.1984) is a Ghanian artist whose main focus is on the importance of representing, documenting, celebrating while discovering the new ways to approach Blackness. His practice combines the ways in which art can reflect and perpetuate the power of representation. He explores Black subjectivity, diversity, and complexity by exclusively presenting individuals from the Diaspora and beyond. Known for the bold colours and patterns in his works, his portraits seek to celebrate his subjects as a way to challenge representation that objectifies and dehumanizes Blackness.
His works have been extensively collected by prestigious private and public institutions such as The Hirshhorn Museum and Sculpture Garden, Washington D.C.; High Museum of Art, Atlanta, Georgia; The Baltimore Museum of Art, Baltimore, MA; The Hammer Museum, Los Angeles, CA; Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum, New York, NY; and Longlati Foundation, Shanghai, China, amongst others.
Image courtesy of Roberts Projects
Represented by Robert Projects, you can follow Amaoko Boafo and their work here.
With the conscious and vibrant use of black and white in Muholi’s works, the intimate and familial theme in Crosby’s portraits, the bold colours and patterns in Boafo’s works, contemporary African artists continue to test and redefine the definition of portraiture in the contemporary art world.
