‘Nigerians haven’t started painting yet’

My name is Duke Asidere. I schooled in the Ahmadu Bello University (ABU), Zaria, which I left in 1988 with my first degree. I went back there to do a second degree which I completed in 1990 and, soon after that, I worked with Auchi Polytechnic; I taught painting, drawing, art history, and also handled […]

My name is Duke Asidere. I schooled in the Ahmadu Bello University (ABU), Zaria, which I left in 1988 with my first degree. I went back there to do a second degree which I completed in 1990 and, soon after that, I worked with Auchi Polytechnic; I taught painting, drawing, art history, and also handled HND projects. I left there in 1995 and moved back to Lagos to face more conscious studio practice. In 2005 I was invited by the Delta state government to help them jumpstart the arts department at Agbarha-Otor. After that, I returned to my studio in Lagos.

 Why did you leave the academia for the studio?

There are three kinds of people teaching in art schools. There are the politicians, who form the bulk of people there; there are the studio artists; and then there are those on the bridge—they don’t know whether they should cross or not. I had wanted to mix with the few artists and learning at ABU offered me the opportunity to see them, and work with them.

You have people who talk art, and you have people who do art. Those who talk art form the bulk of those who are in the art schools—they’re people who threaten students, who take advantage of students, who take bribe from students, etc. And there are those who do their studio work. It would be a shame [for me] to wake up 20 years from now and say I wish I had painted.

Why did you choose to study art in the university then?

Why I studied art? I don’t think I have a straightforward answer. I really would have loved to have got a BSc in Physics—Physics was my strongest subject in [secondary] school. But sometimes your life drags you—there are things in your life that you can’t control.

Looking at your paintings, one wonders what actually you are trying to capture. What is your major focus?

I live in a country that has so much potential. And it pains me to see that people who have been entrusted, who are supposed to hold our economy in trust, have mindlessly [betrayed the trust]. My work, as an artist, isn’t reactionary—I don’t want to react. So my work [is] the sum total of my emotion, the sum total of our collective lack of consistent focus. There are social issues—I think shelter is a very serious issue; I think energy is a very serious issue; and artists [shouldn’t] keep shying away from their realities—I don’t see any artist who could do so much work when there is no light. And I don’t think governance is rocket science really—something you need a PhD to do; I think society is run from the heart. The same love you have for your child—transmit that to every child in Nigeria. The same fears you have for your child—take care of those fears for [every child in Nigeria]. So we must have a protectionist government. I’m not asking for welfare, we’re not asking for handouts. We’re asking for the basic [things].

There is a dichotomy between art for art’s sake and art as a medium for sending a message. Is your art for its sake or a medium for a message?

I think art should have a purpose really, to a large level. But I’d like to say that there’s commercial art and there’s non-commercial art. It’s the definition you give your work that it carries. So I often say to people ‘put your best on that canvas, put your best into that drawing—let that drawing be the best you can do in 2009. When June comes, do the drawing of June; don’t delay what you’ll do today till tomorrow. My art is a major part of my life. My work has changed consistently from the time I was in school; it keeps evolving because I’m still getting fresh information.  What I do for a particular exhibition is for that exhibition; immediately after, I go back to my studio and start with a fresh scope of thinking. Our innate dreams—our innate ambitions—drive us. My worry is that those who steal money don’t think; and when people who don’t think run a society, the society crashes.

If that is the case, how do you see a society run by artists who share the same ideals as you?

In life, you choose something you’re going to dedicate your life to. I’ve chosen a path I’m not likely to deviate from. And I have other things beyond just painting—if I have to ease out, I could just travel, I could just take a walk in my neighbourhood. But I always say that there are those who need to rule society—anybody who has a passion to do right, who has a passion to do justice, and who will not steal even if he’s pushed to. These are the people who should run government.

 Amongst all the great names in painting, who would say has influenced you or your work?

I was very fortunate I went to school when lecturers were very passionate about the work they did, and I also schooled under lecturers who were in the habit of painting daily. But knowledge expands, ideas expand. So what was impossible 20 years ago is possible now. So it is the mind that says, ‘Oh, we could put glass on water, we could do this’. It is in that perspective that art is done.  The artist’s role is that of a futuristic person because he’s in the future; most of the time the artist is far ahead of his generation.

Where do you get your inspirations from?

Most of the time it’s just by sitting down and thinking. When I get back to Lagos, I intend to paint a picture of a coal iron. I haven’t seen a coal iron for maybe 15 years; but when I was preparing for this trip to Abuja, I had to get a dry cleaner to come and iron my clothes with a coal iron. I photographed the iron. It really takes you aback.

Was there any time in your childhood when you started imagining yourself as a painter and you took your pencil and started experimenting with drawings?

 I think childhood is the most exciting part of life. Way back, [while I was] growing up, I saw a lot of things moving in my mind. However, my first conscious attachment to drawing was when I was about 10. When it comes to painting, I think, to a large level, I have been extremely lucky. I met the right persons at the right time: when I needed to improve my drawing, I met the right persons; when I needed to improve my painting, I met the right persons. I started out in Auchi when it was as if we were competing amongst ourselves. Of course we were young, so we pushed ourselves.

As someone who once taught art, how would you assess the quality of Nigeria’s future artists, whom you must have graded?

Interestingly, where I lectured, all the students were people who had potential. There are people I met—somebody like Alex Nwokolo, as a student in my class, I could beat my chest and say ‘this guy will get somewhere’. A lot of people go to art school because they have no other place to go. Some go because they think they can do it.

Where will Nigerian art be in another 20 years? There’s so much in the Nigerian; it’s not just in the arts. If the Nigerian, under a terrible condition, comes out glowing, under normal condition he will take over the world in every filed—not just in the arts. Give the Nigerian constant power supply, water, and other basic necessities—not even too much money—he will glow. So there’s a great potential in our young artists, there’s a lot of promise.

What are your future plans?

I have an upcoming show, and there’s a lot of work to be done. It’s not in the artist to say, ‘Oh I’m done’. No, you cannot say ‘I have made the best painting in my life’: we haven’t even started painting yet. I’ll be learning from the next set of works.