An Invitation to the Most Extensive, Publicly Accessible Photo and Video Archive Related to the Nigerian Artist Bruce Onobrakpeya, One of the Greatest Explorers of Classical African Spiritualities

[Oluwatoyin Adepoju]

                     An Invitation to the Most Extensive,  Publicly Accessible Photo and Video Archive Related to the  Nigerian Artist Bruce Onobrakpeya

                                               One the Greatest Explorers of Classical African Spiritualities

                                                                    Oluwatoyin Vincent Adepoju 

                                                                                    Compcros 

                                                      Comparative Cognitive Processes and Systems 

                                            " Exploring Every Corner of the Cosmos in Search of Knowledge"

Here is a link to the most extensive, publicly accessible photo archive related to the Nigerian artist Bruce Onobrakpeya, one of the greatest explorers of classical African spiritualities.

https://photos.app.goo.gl/JAxptrQx2mbkqHECA

They are photographs and videos by myself exploring the life and art of the artist within a concentric circle expanding outwards from his person and art, to his human and material contexts, within his Mushin, Lagos neighborhood, where he lives, to his natal community of Oghara, in the Niger Delta, where he was born, to nearby Agbarha-Otor, which houses galleries demonstrating the essence of his work and where  the annual Harmattan Workshops for art training and networking are held, as well as Ughelli,near Agbarha.

The images and videos cover Onobrakpeya exhibitions in Lagos, and  pictures and videos, largely video interviews, of him in his Mushin, Lagos house and at the Onobrak Arts Centre in his home community of Agbarha, as well as pictures and videos of him jogging, walking and interacting with other artists at the February 2024 session of the Harmattan Workshop.

They run from visuals focused on him to image and video explorations of parts of  his house and compound at Mushin, Lagos, which functions as an art gallery and workshop, interviews with his Mushin neighbors and pictures and videos of his Mushin neighbourhood and surrounding cityscapes, contextualizing the immediate environments that feed his art and project his lifestyle, to pictures and videos of his natal Agbarha environment and nearby Ughelli, demonstrating his native human, spiritual and artistic context from which his art has grown,along with his interactions with the artists at the Harmattan Workshop.

They also include images and videos of my journeys to and from the 2024 Harmattan Workshop  and interactions with the people and environments there.

This archive also contains the first visual records of aspects of Agbarha-Otor spiritual and artistic culture beyond Onobrakpeya's work, exposure gained through interacting with priests of classical Urhobo spiritualities and their shrines in Agbarha-Otor.

These pictures and videos represent the most comprehensive, publicly accessible visual coverage of Onobrakpeya and subjects directly related to him.

The essays that have come out of this initiative are at the Facebook page In Search of Bruce Onobrakpeya,  https://www.facebook.com/share/1AAv2oL84Z/ demonstrating the adventures involved and the emerging insights from  seeking understanding of the master and his human and material contexts from Mushin to Agbarha.

All the pictures and videos  were taken between 2023 and 2024 and some before.

They are foundational to my ongoing extensive study of Onobrakpeya's life and work,directed at producing the first full length biography of this artist  from his beginnings to his current active life in his early 90s.

I shall be organizing the images and videos into thematic units to facilitate appreciation of the story they tell.