BRINGING together, artists, historians, performers and culture enthusiasts for the annual Lagos Easter Art Carnival, leading contemporary art gallery, the Fobally Art World Africa, recently held a week-long immersive exploration of African art and culture from the 1800s and how that period is influencing art today.

Held at Federal Palace Hotel in Lagos and themed, African Culture in the 1800s, the exhibition, now in its third consecutive year, explored the intersection of historical resilience and future sustainability.

It highlighted the 19th-century African experience, characterised by profound cultural vitality alongside external pressures as a foundational, living heritage that can be leveraged to build a sustainable future through art and cultural education.

Fobally’s research-based art approach reconstructed the 1800s not just as a time of colonial pressure, but as a period of adaptation, resilience and rich identity.

It showcased varied regional experiences, such as the blending of indigenous traditions with European and Islamic influences in 19th-century Senegal and the 1800s in South Africa featuring a mix of indigenous Zulu, Xhosa and Sotho clan-based societies, characterised by ancestral worship, energetic performances (Ndula) and communal living.

Creative director of the gallery and the exhibition’s curator, Folasade Abiola, noted that the period serves as a metaphor for cultural rebirth and the exhibition examines how communities maintained their identity amid profound changes, depicted through a variety of mediumsand showcasing the ingenuity of traditional practices.

Aiming to use this historical knowledge to guide contemporary and future generations by focusing on sustainability through cultural preservation and rebirth, she said in using the past to educate the present, they intend to build a future where younger generations are connected to their roots. “The goal is to infuse the traditional Easter celebrations and travel down century lane of 200 years with you, with a modern twist, reflecting on our ancient traditions and culture past down different generations, as well as the resilience of African people to make this carnival a truly storytelling educative event,” she said.

Featuring a curated collection of paintings and sculptures from established masters and emerging talents, the exhibition also featured artistic displays, live painting and performing arts.

Beyond the artistic showcase, the Art Carnival alsoserved as a hub for community engagement witheducational programs, workshops and initiatives that promoted creativity, cultural awareness and social responsibility.

Keynote speaker, Associate Professor of Fine and Applied Arts at the University of Lagos, Timothy Olusola Ogunfuwa, tracing the history of arts over the last few centuries, noted that the 1800s were a defining epoch across the African continent. Describing the period as one of thriving kingdoms, complex trade networks, spiritual traditions and artistic mastery, he said in Yorubaland for instance, regal courts flourished with bead-work, bronze casting, and indigo-dyed textiles, all of which reflect heavily in artworks today.

“Across the Sahel, trans-Saharan commerce carried not only goods but ideas, culture and arts. In Central and Southern Africa, oral traditions preserved genealogies and cosmologies that continue to shape identity, art and way of life today. Art does not exist in isolation and while we can argue that art today look different, the truth is that when examined closely, they look just like art from that period. This only shows the influence the period has on modern art as we know it today,” he said.

At a panel discussion anchored by Folasade Abiola, other panelists included Dr Adeola Balogun, Dr Solomon Adekunle Adeyemi, Edna Abugewa Wyse-Ekenimoh and Rasheed Adedamola Amodu, they delved deeper into art from the period, its influence on modern art and possible influence on future art as well as the sustainability of visual and cultural arts.