Enwonwu's Tutu

Quinn: Hello, and welcome back to Pictorial on Relay FM. I’m Quinn Rose and I did not go to art school, but I still love learning about art all the time.

Betty: I’m Betty. I also didn't go to art school, but of course I love learning about art.

Quinn: So today we are talking about the story behind the painting that has been sometimes called the African Mona Lisa. It's called Tutu, and it set the record for the most expensive art sale of a modern Nigerian art piece in history so far at $1.6 million. So I'm going to tell you the story about what this painting is and who the artist was, and how it was missing for decades. But just to start off, I have sent you the image of this painting, and I was wondering if you could react to it, maybe even describe it for the audience who aren't looking at it right now.

Betty: Okay. So it is a portrait and it's in portrait… mode.

Quinn: [laughs] Phones have broken our brains.

Betty: It's a portrait, that is a portrait [laughing]. So, and it is of a woman who seems to be looking far off into the distance, and she appears to be Black and she is wearing, I think, I don't know if I would call like a head dress or a turban type of a head piece. And she seems to have like a, quite a slender neck and then she's wearing a, what looks like fabric draped over her shoulders. Although I'm not sure if it's just like a dress or something that's got a lot of folds and fabric. And it seems to be blue and white and it looks kind of silky, but the whole picture is dark in terms of lighting, it seems like it's like a dimly lit picture. And I would say the style is like realistic representation, but the brushstrokes are kind of loose. And then in the background, it seems like it's backlit, there's like a bit of glow in the background. And the background is just like a blurry, glowing background.

Quinn: Does this painting remind you of any other paintings that you've seen?

Betty: Well, I don’t know if like my mind got clouded by earlier when you said some people call it the African Mona Lisa, like, I can definitely see this is a type of portrait, like the connections I can make to it is that someone who has a pretty neutral expression similar to the Mona Lisa, and it does have this like triangular kind of composition similar to it. Even though the Mona Lisa is like much zoomed out, you see more of the body. But I would say other than that, I don't immediately think of anything else.

Quinn: That's very interesting. I was wondering if you would name Girl with a Pearl Earring because this painting is framed in quite the same way. Like the subject of the painting is also somewhat turned away from the viewer and also is looking over her left shoulder, which is very similar to the way that the subject is framed in Girl With a Pearl Earring. As a, as a foundation I just wanted to see if, what sort of influences you were picking up on. Well we are going to get back into all of that and all of the sort of artistic elements of this painting. But first I'm going to take a step back and talk about the artist. So this was painted by a man named Ben Enwonwu and he is just like the most successful Nigerian artist ever. Like one of the famous, one of the most famous artists out of the entire continent of Africa, like there's a crater named after him on Mercury. So to talk a bit about his background, Enwonwu was born in 1917. So he was an artist like all through the 20th century, basically. He didn't pass away until 1994. And he was active till the end of his life. So his body of work like spans a really long time. He started art fairly early in his life. His father was actually a sculptor and so he pretty much inherited being a sculptor like right away. But then in the 1940s, when he was in his twenties, he had the opportunity to study fine arts. And he, along with four other students who are kind of collectively known as the Murray School, were the first group of Nigerian students trained in European artistic techniques by the British colonial government. So he has a really interesting sort of background where he is trained in these like colonialist, European fine arts, and was one of the first Nigerian artists to be trained in that, which is why like you can see when he pulls influence from like Renaissance painters and other kinds of these artworks, but he's also talked extensively about how, like, he doesn't say that he's influenced by European artists, because like he's talked to European artists, European artists are influenced by African artists. He's just returning the cycle home.

Betty: I feel like when I study a lot of artists they’re quite often, especially if they're, if they're portrait or if they paint figures, they're quite often sculptors as well as painters. Like I think some people will seem to think, oh, someone is a sculptor or they're a painter. And sometimes it's like, yes, I'm somebody who does more of the other. But like, whether you're talking about like Michelangelo or Henry Moore, like a lot of these people who are known for one over the other, they do both. And I do think that being able to understand a three-dimensional form—like, it sounds obvious, but it's like, sometimes you don't think about it. That of course being, having that sculpture, sculptural training in 3d, then you would be much better at representing it on a two-dimensional plane.

Quinn: Oh yeah. And he continued creating art as a sculpture and other mediums throughout his life, like he did not just like switch to painting and was like, this is it now everybody. In fact, like some of his most famous pieces are his sculptures. Before he made this painting, we're not, we're not there yet, but even in the decades before he made this painting, he was chosen by the Queen of England to sculpt her portrait in 1956, which actually was like pretty funny because he was actively engaged in anti-colonial movements. And then Queen Elizabeth was like, that guy could sculpt me. So that's interesting. But, but he sculpted her. And the queen sat for him about a dozen times. And the sculpture was completed in 1957. And then about 10 years later in 1966 he actually finished this bronze sculpture of this figure, and this was for the United Nations in New York, and it is still on display at the United Nations. So he's, he's got some pretty high profile sculptures, especially of sort of like people and like humanoid figures, all over the world really. Well among all of this work that he was doing, as I talked about, like he was trained in Western art techniques and he also he also like extensively studied African techniques and he was one of the pioneering people to create African modernism. And he was like the first African artists to be internationally recognized as a like high achieving contemporary artist, which… I mean, we all know why there's not that many. And it's not because the artists in Africa aren’t amazing. It's because the world is deeply, deeply racist, but I'm, I'm trying not to get, I don't want to get too negative about anything. Like, I just want to like talk about how awesome this guy is and like how cool his work is. So like, I'm not going to get into that, but among like, obviously a lot of like really messed up stuff about the way that artists are talked about and everything that he had to deal with in his life, the work that he made was amazing. And along the way, he talked and wrote a lot about his position as an African artist and the way that he existed in the wider art world. And he like really recognized what his place was in that, and was really proud of the way that he was able to open doors for a lot of artists who were younger than him, because he almost single-handedly, it seems like, sort of legitimized the idea of like being a Nigerian artist and pursuing that as a career and a passion.

Betty: A parallel that I can personally draw is a while ago when we spoke about, I think the Canadian artist Carl Beam, his success and achievement—a lot of people and he probably personally believed was that he was one of the first and if not, the first Canadian Indigenous artists to be known as like, primarily as a contemporary artist like that's a, that's an internationally renowned contemporary artist. And that his painting was the first one that made it to the National Gallery’s contemporary wing and not the Indigenous wing. And, but the interesting thing is like, his topics are about his culture and heritage as somebody who grew up under, who grew up as an Indigenous person, but there's mixtures of colonialism in his work. So like, it's, he's not like actively rejecting his own culture or anything, but at the same time, it's like really like, the goal of a lot of these artists, as far as I know, anyway, is to reach an international audience, is that they want to be known as a contemporary artist like before anything else usually. But at the same time, they're like, but of course my inspirations and a lot of like, my work is about like me and what I experienced and, or like my, my cultural history and things like that. So like, I feel like personally, that's how I frame it in a, like, not necessarily negative way. Like even though obviously there's problems, like why it took this long for artists like these to get recognized.

Quinn: Yeah. I think the whole aspect of like being recognized specifically as a contemporary artist and having your work be recognized as part of like the modernist movement in Enwonwu’s use case is a big part of this because of the way, like, especially with Indigenous peoples, but also, but also with African peoples as well, just like the really active propaganda in, in lots of countries about how like, these cultures are like less advanced or, or even that these people don't exist anymore and they’re historical. And it's just like, the amount of propaganda that an artist has to break through in order to be seen at all, and especially to be recognized as someone like, that is both like, of course, like informed by their culture and traditions, the way that every single human being is, and also is a contemporary artist who is groundbreaking in their field, is just an ongoing battle. But as I think is very clear, like Enwonwu was extremely successful in his lifetime, which is always awesome to see. And one of the things that he did a lot was having sort of positions at various universities and institutions and things. And from 1971 to 1975, he was a professor of Fine Arts at the University of Ile-Efe. And this is when he met the subject of this painting. And so the, this woman, her name was actually Adetutu, but she was Tutu for short and she was actually a princess. She was the granddaughter of a former ruler of the city. And she actually caught his eye just like out and about, because he thought she was so beautiful. And he specifically noted like her long neck as an aspect of her beauty, which I thought was so funny that you picked up on in the painting that she has like a very slender neck, because that was one of the things that he noticed specifically. And he basically like went to her and her family and he was like, hey, like, can I do a portrait of you? And they're like, I don’t know, I don't know. And this is not as simple as it sounds. Because this is happening in the early 1970s. And this is right after Nigerian Civil War, which was 1967 to 1970. And obviously as with all wars, there was a lot going on that we're not going to get into, this is extremely broad brush strokes, but what's important and relevant for this particular story is that Enwonwu is a member of an ethnic group known as the Igbo, and the subject of the painting, Tutu, was a member of an ethnic group named the Yorubans. And they were on opposite sides of this civil war. So there was a lot of distrust of him when he was questioning if he could paint this woman. But her family did allow it. And she sat for these paintings and he created this portrait of her. He considered it his masterpiece and it became a symbol of reconciliation in Nigeria. Like this beautiful traditional portrait of this beautiful royal woman that was painted by someone who was on the quote unquote like opposite side only a few years previously. And then of course, like, it's a really good painting. And so this not only became a symbol of reconciliation, it's incredibly, incredibly popular in Nigeria. There was actually a quote that Chimamanda Adichie, who's this author, she was giving an interview in 2013 and she brought up this painting and she was like, every middle-class family in Nigeria had a print of this painting hanging on their wall. Like it's just, it is just like ubiquitous in Nigeria.

Betty: That’s so interesting. So this just reminded me of something, and not to kind of like this, stretch it, tie it back to our last episode or anything. I don't want to tell too much of, it's kind of a personal story, but I recently learned that a member of my family who is no longer alive, who was alive during World War II, like had their life saved by a Japanese soldier. So my family is Chinese and obviously, or not obviously, some people don't realize that there's, there's racial tensions between Chinese and Japanese people. Not everybody, but like to this day, because of World War II. And some people are obviously like what, like, they fought on opposite sides of World War II? But I'm like, it's okay if people are only aware of European World War II history, but I, I'm obviously very much aware. And, and honestly like, this story, I think is the, one of the reasons why like my family specifically don't have any antagonism towards Japanese people. And I'm not saying that everybody needs a story like this to get over like racial hatred. But I, I do think that like this, these stories and these connections, like, obviously I'm like, of course there are humane soldiers in a war and people who of course, would save the life of a child on the other side. But like, you don't, that's not the story you hear. Like when you talk to families who have fought in the war, they're like, oh no, my enemies were trying to kill me, and that's why I hate them. And it's just like, okay.

Quinn: Well, I think that that points to the way that these kinds of symbols can be so important, like, especially in cases of war and civil war and these kinds of conflicts, where there is so much going into, like, trying to make you hate the other side and distrust the other side. And things like a personal story that, that paint a different picture or like, literally a differently painted picture, can have incredible potency in getting over some of those aspects. So as I said before, Enwonwu considered this his masterpiece, and he did not want to sell it. He had, he had a problem, like, selling a lot of pieces because they were so precious to him. So he created prints of them, which as I said, are basically all over Nigeria. And he also painted two more versions of it and sold those so that he didn't have to part with the original. Very sadly in 1994, like shortly before he passed away, his house was broken into and the painting was stolen. So just absolute tragedy, this painting was stolen, it hasn't been seen since. Well, it's been seen by somebody, but like the wider world still does not know where the original is. Meanwhile, there are those other two versions which have also been lost. The second Tutu was last seen in 1975 at an exhibition at an Italian embassy. But then it disappeared and, and hasn't been seen since. Now here's where the story gets really fun. So there is a man named Giles Peppiatt, who is the director of African Art at Bonhams in the UK. And he has spent decades trying to find these paintings. Just decades. And he, like, a lot of people have brought him prints of things and whatever, and it's never been the real thing. And then he got this tip that there, it might be in this place, right? He goes to what he describes as a “modest apartment” in North London in like late 2017. And it's just on the wall. Like it's Enwonwu’s Tutu, the second version. It's just on the wall. The family had no idea. It was just like a thing—the painting had been in their family for a couple of decades. They just hung it on the wall. They were like, they had no idea like who painted it, how valuable it was. The art director was on the floor.

Betty: This is wild.

Quinn: So the family who had it has remained anonymous. So we don't know who they are. It's obviously pretty suspicious that this priceless African painting has ended up in this random apartment in London. The, the people who had at the time said that like, oh, like, I don't know where it came from. Like my dad bought it from somebody. It kind of seems like the people who had it in the end were just like, oh, uh, I don't know. We just have had this. We liked it. It was on the wall. I don't know. And they didn't know like where it came from and they clear they, like, they didn't know who the artist was or how valuable it was.

Betty: I suspect if they did know how valuable it was, it would not, they would not have just been like, oh.

Quinn: And so then this painting was sold at auction and it sold for 1.2 million pounds or over $1.6 million, which as I said at the beginning is the most expensive modernist Nigerian painting ever.

Betty: In my opinion, should have been sold for more. But, I mean, I don't have that much money, but yeah.

Quinn: I couldn't figure throughout who bought it. Like I kept trying to find, like nobody says who bought it. It has been on display in Nigeria since then, so that's great. It wasn't just like somebody like bought it and then hid it. Or so it was in display in 2019 at the Art X Lagos' exhibition in Nigeria. And so at least it's like out there now. And at least it's being like shown in Nigeria and not just like in like France or something, some random art collectors. So that's nice. I don't know where it is currently. There is a pandemic, so who knows where it is. I assume somebody knows where it is because I feel like they're going to keep really careful track of it.

Betty: Yeah, well I keep thinking, I have a couple of comments, but the thing I keep thinking of is… this painting should have had an NFT. I'm like, obviously, obviously not necessarily the nature of an NFT right now, a more sustainable one where it can be tracked—if it had a contract where you can just pull up its provenance and be like, oh, look, these are all the people that have owned it. Obviously this still doesn't prevent somebody from stealing paintings.

Quinn: They should put one of those Tile trackers on the back of the frame. Stick it out on there.

Betty: Yeah. RFID tag. The thing that it really actually makes me think of, and the reason why I say like, I'm actually kind of surprised it only sold for 1.6 million, because there's a similar story, which I'm so sorry, I have to tie it back to the place I work almost every single time, but this is where I get most of my art experience. But at the Art Gallery of Ontario in Toronto, our most prized possession, like our, like our quote unquote crown jewel is the Massacre of the Innocent by Peter Paul Rubens. And people usually get really mad about this painting and how expensive it was when this person bought it in 2001. So this Canadian businessman called Ken Thompson bought this piece, Massacre of the Innocent by Rubens for 49.5 million, which is equivalent to 117 million Canadian dollars in 2001. So like this was 20 years ago. So like that, even just tracking inflation, it would be like, I don't know how much, but a lot more than 117 million. So, but the thing is like, obviously as an, as a public art institution, we didn't buy it. It was donated by Ken Thompson. So when he purchased it, he purchased it anonymously. So nobody knew who bought Rubens’ painting until it was later donated to us. And I believe he was still alive when it was revealed that it was him, but then he died shortly after. So anyway, like he didn't want people to know that it was him. And so the reason, or the primary reason this Rubens painting sold for, at the time it actually broke the record for most expensive painting ever sold, it's since been broken, but it was because most Rubens pieces were—and he's like a really famous artist from the Dutch Golden Age. There was like no new Rubens is to be discovered except for one that had been lost in the 1700s somewhere in Vienna. It was last seen, and then just, nobody knew where it was. That's why, when it went for auction, it was like super sought after and people were, you know, people were fighting over it and that's one of the reasons it became, it sold for almost 50 million pounds. So, and it was, I think at the time Ken Thompson was the richest person in Canada. So that makes sense why it was like one of the few people in the world who can afford this. But again, I am thankful for the fact that Ken Thompson's decision was yeah, like I'm going to display it at a public art institution.

Quinn: I mean, the context of how much money this sold for is more clear when you know that at this particular sale that this painting was purchased at there were like 20 other Enwonwu artworks. And so like this, this man had a lot of work and like some of the other paintings that were sold there were sold for like $150,000. And so like, obviously that's a lot of money, but it's not $1.6 million kind of money. And so this value is so high because it's considered his masterpiece, but also because it disappeared. And that actually brings me all the way to my very final little fun fact about this, which is another one Enwonwu’s paintings that was lost before, like showed up again! Not one of the Tutus but a painting called Christine. About like the next year was discovered—or no, sorry, I think in 2019 was discovered, this painting called Christine. It was another portrait of another woman actually. And once that was recovered and identified as, as an authentic Enwonwu painting, it sold for $1.4 million at auction. And so I personally, like this gives me hope that the other Tutus may still be found. And it's great to see like, Enwonwu’s son Oliver is actually also a painter and gallerist just who is actively maintaining his father's legacy through the Ben Enwonwu Foundation. And he's spoken a lot about the sort of increased visibility that his father's work has gotten in the past few years with the recovery of these two paintings. And with obviously like the increased value that's been placed on them by people buying these works as they are coming back into the public eye. And so it's obviously like really exciting for him and his family and for all of Nigerian artists, honestly, and having this greater spotlight shown on them. And also all of the stuff happening, like personally, it gives me hope that they will recover the other two Tutus someday. And like maybe like all three of them could be brought back together. I think that would be amazing if it ever happens.

Betty: I now want to, once there is not a pandemic anymore, which we'll see when that's going to happen. I would love to be able to see this artist's work. Like you know, just more than these, these few works that I've now looked up because like, I love just seeing, you know, a retrospective of any artist's work, but I think, if you can get these works all together in one room, that would also be super significant, not just in terms of like, oh, it's been recovered, but I think now knowing that there is a story that actually makes a connection among people of Nigeria and that this actually is much more meaningful probably to someone there than it is to someone else who is isn't aware of the context. Like I think that would just be, that would be amazing.

Quinn: We honestly only scratched the surface of this artist today, as we so often do. There's just so much to talk about with these really great, these really great artists. And so we can only ever do little slices of them. But this was a very fun story to dive into. I also should have said at the beginning I learned about this and this particular story from the book Black Futures which is this amazing anthology book. And so also, like I highly recommend reading the book Black Futures which has information about this particular painting, but also like tons and tons of like other Black artists and activists and like, all that good stuff. Read the book. It's amazing.

Betty: This is not the first time we talked about artworks being sold for a lot of money. And I do think like every time we do, like when things are in the millions, there is an aspect to it where some people are like, why is art, why are artworks like so expensive? And we don't have to get back into that topic again. But the thing I do think is interesting is that while there are people who are like using art as an investment, there are a lot of people who just really like a painting and that there is a personal connection that they have to it. And that very often actually like among wealthy people, these types of things are an emotional purchase. And like when people think about, you know, like, why are, why would someone like pay that much money for something? Other than just, they have too much money, and it really could be like, you know, you, you can't put a value, or it's difficult to put a value on, on like how much something means to you. And then for some people it's just like, well, it's worth as much as I can afford. And there is another piece that I've made a video about, where it is an artwork that has a deep connection to Toronto. And that it also was a piece that sold for over 4 million that a lot of people are like, oh my God. Like why and how and, you know, it, it's just a painting of a rainbow, but I'm like, well, you don't know what it means to the LGBTQ community of this city. And only really those of us who kind of grew up in this environment does, that's why some people are like this painting to us is priceless, but maybe to someone else it's like, it's just a painting. And that's why I think here it's like maybe to, like to me, I looked at him like, oh, this is a beautiful painting of a beautiful woman. And yeah, like I would probably pay a lot of money for it. But a lot of money for me, it's like $250. So, but to someone else, it means so much more.

Quinn: Well, thanks everybody for listening to this episode of Pictorial. As we wrap up here, I wanted to tell you about another show on Relay FM you might like, which is Automators. It is a podcast all about how to automate your devices and automate your life. And so all the time that you spend doing all these little tasks several times a week, or even every day, that’s time you could be getting back by automating all the things in your life to work for you. It’s hosted by David Sparks and Rosemary Orchard and they all so much about this stuff, it is incredible.

Betty: Automation is actually something I’m super interested in. It’s not something I’m very good at, like I use Zapier and IFTTT to try to automate my life. And I just found out recently that my boyfriend listens to Automators! I think he saw me on something and he was like, “do you know Rosemary Orchard?” and I was like “yes…” and he was like “oh my God, this is amazing.” So it’s not just me and Quinn, it’s also someone I live with also would vouch for listening to this show.

Quinn: So if you want your devices to do more for you, you can go to relay.fm/automators or search for Automators wherever you get your podcasts. You can find our show notes at relay.fm/pictorial, or you can find us on Twitter or Instagram @PictorialPod. You can also find me on Instagram @aspiringrobotfm.

Betty: And you can find me on Twitter or Instagram @articulationsv and I am also on YouTube as ARTiculations. Speaking of YouTube, we also upload these podcast episodes to YouTube, but usually a few weeks after the release of the audio versions. So you can go to the Pictorial YouTube channel to watch and look at this beautiful painting as we talk about it.

Quinn: Thanks for listening, art enthusiasts!