towards a new culture; rethinking the african modern – the architecture of demas nwoko. by giles...

7/22/2019 Towards a New Culture; Rethinking the African Modern The Architecture of Demas Nwoko. By Giles Omezi [2007]

1/8

bukka

Towards a New Culture; Rethinkingthe African Modern The Architecture of Demas Nwoko

by Giles Omezi [ 2007 ]

+++++++++++++++++++++

Introduction

As Nigeria edges close to its fiftieth year of independence in 2010, there no doubt will be a fair amount ofintrospection and a good deal of self flagellation on the state of the nation. With this in mind, it is perhaps

useful to examine the spatial component of cultural production within the formulation of a Nigerian post-colonial identity that may be observed in the architecture of Demas Nwoko. He is better known as an artist inNigeria, as a member of the Nigerian avant-garde art group; The Zaria Art Society, established in 1958. Hisarchitecture has recently roused interest of scholars, with a book by the Anglo-West African modernists JohnGodwin and Gillian Hopwood due imminently. I however view his architecture as the logical completion of a

series of restless enquiries that took him through sculpture, painting, theatre production and built form. Fourdecades of architectural production has received little coverage in the international critical architecture press,save for a passing mention by Noel Moffet in the RIBA Journal special on Nigeria in 1977, and even then thework published [the Dominican Institute, Ibadan] was credited to a self help effort not to Demas Nwoko. It is

the absence of any African work in the critical discourse of Architecture that has forced me to closelyexamine his work within the theoretical context of the early art movement that he was part of.

Demas Nwoko conveys a deep sense of conviction about the ideas that underpin his work; he has embarked

on a lonely journey to take the ideas of the Zaria Art Societys manifesto Natural Synthesis into the spatialrealm. Completion of his commissions take time, he acknowledges the accretive nature of building in Africa,

allowing the possibility to add to buildings over time. On the other hand projects have been drawn out overdecades as is the case with the Akenzua Cultural Centre in Benin that was commissioned in 1972 andcompleted in 1995. Most importantly is his acute questioning of the notion of meaning particularly throughthe process of appropriation; for instance he states the aesthetic experience of the landscape is individually

contemplative and therefore would obstruct effective communication between two people since both or onecould be lost in this beautiful phenomenon of natures handiwork

ihere the visual dialogue between inside

and outside via the window, a particularly northern European detail is questioned. His journey took him into

the political realm when in 1992 he sought to set up a political party to contest the presidential elections, thisled to the publication of his book The Impoverished Generation; the poormans Clean Rags; Thephilosophy of an African Democracy in what for all intents and purposes was the partys manifesto. Here

New Culture supplants the early idea of Natural Synthesis, evolving into full-blown ideology. What is

interesting at this stage is that the agitation is no longer against colonial rule but the post colonial state,Demas recognises the appropriating of the colonial power structures by the national elite accuratelydescribed by Frantz Fanon in his book Wretched of Earth, and he seeks to place production at the centre of

an evolution of a modern African society, the lack of witheringly identified by Fanon. He advocates an


2/8

accretive approach to the acquisition of technology, warning against the large-scale industrialisation model in

favour of localised interventions that would mobilise labour and build up a developmental momentum that hefelt would enable Nigeria catch up with the rest of the world. Demas Nwoko has been consistent in hispursuit of modernity as a critical process of enquiry and I think in his production of architecture he is able todeploy the ideas of the early manifesto of Natural Synthesis in a courageous manner.

Nationalist origins of Nigerian cultural production

James Coleman in his seminal book; Nigeria; a background to Nationalism published in 1958 seeks to

identify what drove Nigerian nationalist aspirations in the run up to independence. He observes that Thereremained the intangible and insatiable yearning for equality; and to the educated Nigerian, equality was notsimply a matter of sitting at a desk opposite a European and earning the same salary, or of drinking at thesame bar; it would never be complete until he and his fellow Africans were no longer dependent onEuropeans for advice, skill, technology, or power, but were their own masters

ii. We can infer the obvious

from this statement; one of an aspiration by the Nigerian to self-determine the nature of his own modernstate. However we may also speculate that the paradigm aspired to, is essentially western and therefore

open up the possibilities of an appropriative process in the formation of a national identity that is consciouslyeclectic. The process of creating/evolving a modern society will involve continuous evaluation of what exists,which was colonial rule in this instance. This evaluation in pre-independence Nigeria was preoccupied withthe questioning of the right of Britain to rule over the indigenous people within Nigeria, and no doubt led to

searching questions of identity, authenticity, the purpose and potency of traditions and speculations on thehow best to attain success of modernisation that was specific to the Nigerian state. One prevalent positionwas a pragmatic approach that acknowledged the possibility of sampling from both the located and foreign

cultures as the basis for defining a relevant modern Nigerian society, James Coleman observes MostNigerian nationalists are not cultural nativists; they are eclectics, desiring to keep what is useful andattractive in the old and fuse it with the new.

iiiAn apt observation in the context of this essay, as this attitude

forms the essence of the ideological position that has shaped Demas Nwokos oeuvre of cultural productionthat ranges from painting, sculpture, theatre production and architecture as clearly stated in the manifesto ofthe Zaria Art Society Natural Synthesis.

Natural Synthesis to New Culture; Theory to Ideology

Okolobias Sons

Okolobias sons shall learn to live

from fathers failing;

blending diverse culture types,

The cream of native kind

Adaptable alien type;

the dawn of an age

the season of salvationiv

A bit of background on Demas Nwoko is useful. Demas Nwoko was born on 20th December 1935 in IdumujeUgboko in the present Delta State of Nigeria to a royal lineage that traces its origins to the royal house of the

ancient Kingdom of Benin in south-western Nigeria. He was brought up by an uncle, living in variousNigerian colonial towns. He ended up as a draughtsman in the late 1950s in the colonial Public WorksDepartment, and apparently was determined to be an architect but opted instead to study fine arts at thenascent Zaria Art School in Northern Nigeria which was then affiliated with Goldsmiths College London. He

started at Zaria in 1958 and formed with Uche Okeke, Yusuf Grillo, Simon Okeke, William Olaosebikan,Bruce Onabrakpeya, Oseloka Osadebe, Okechukwu Odita, F Efeada, Ogbonnaya Nwagbara and I MOmagie a group they called the Zaria Art Society.

This move elicited cynicism from their contemporaries at the school, which strengthened their resolve toestablish the group as an art movement that was galvanised by three key issues;


3/8

The relevance of the prevalent western art curriculum to the preceding rich art culture; notably Benin,

Ife, Nok etc. that was integral to their individual identities and experiences;

The affiliation of their institution which they viewed as a Nigerian institution in a soon to beindependent Nigeria to Goldsmiths in London and;

The issuing of certificates by the colonial masters in London.

The groups leader Uche Okeke, drew up a manifesto in 1960, two years after the group was formed titled;Natural Synthesis. This was essentially a rhetorical articulation of a theoretical position that sought to

establish a framework for the process of exchange through which a filtering of what was deemed appropriateto the specificity of a contemporary hybrid society could be channelled into cultural production. It also can bethought of as capturing the nationalist zeitgeist that was sweeping through Nigeria at the dawn of

independence seeking to endow this spirit with concrete expression. He included in what could be termedthe groups manifesto an extract of the poem listed above titled; Okolobias Sons.

An extract from the Natural Synthesis manifesto worth mentioning is Uche Okekes statement; Our Society

calls for a synthesis of old and new, of functional art and art for its own sakev. It would appear that what

probably underlies this angst and desire to construct progress in a specific manner can be described as anaspect of modernity in the sense presented by Anonio Negri where he states that; Modernity itself is definedby crisis, a crisis that is born out of uninterrupted conflict between the immanent, constructive, creative forces

and the transcendent power aimed at restoring ordervi. We can allude therefore that the processes that

defined the aspiration to modernity by the Zaria Art Society were essentially of a reactive nature; they soughtto provide an alternative to the imposed modern, by sourcing from what was available to sample, and

channelling this physically into the realm of cultural production. The members of the group are commonlyreferred to as the Zaria Rebels, a description the surviving members tend to dislike but not discourage, theirnotoriety at the time leading them to be participants in the Independence Celebration Trade Fair 1960 where

Demas Nwoko and Uche Okeke produced the Federal Government Pavillion. They were also core to theformation of the Mbari Club which included writers Chinua Achebe and Wole Soyinka and eventually wereparticipant in the centralised state production of Nigerian National culture in FESTAC 1977.

vii

The emergent ideology of synthesis informed the intellectual template for Demas Nwoko to engagearchitecturally, his early experiments in sculpture led to reproduction of terracotta pieces that referenced theancient Nok terracotta figures. He engaged in mimetic production of pseudo-replicas that thoughcontemporary, evoked antiquity texturally. He devised a deep kiln technique that used green teak logs

placed in proximity to the sculptures that resulted in the variegated colouring from the burning of resinousmatter close to the clay and the glazing of sand fragments that was reminiscent of the pieces from Nok

antiquity. Demas Nwokos architectural application of Natural Synthesis sought to place modernity beyondthe ethno centric confines of a purely European narrative, having successfully decoded its perceived cynicalnature through his art. The dwelling space he decided was also not subject to the constraints of thisnarrative. He sought to resolve in his architecture, a crisis at the heart of contemporary Africa; the nature of

its modernity. He seems to have understood, that the process of modernity is not the sole property ofEurocentric thought and actions. The nature of technology is such that it is not the preserve of any race ortimeviii he wrote in 1992, articulating further the essence of Natural Synthesisix as posited by Uche Okeke.

The issue which burns through the psyche of the African it seems is the resolution of the imposed with thelocated, amplified at the dawn of independence, hardening since in an increasingly globalised world, into a

complexity which often compounds a clear reading. It represents the tensions between the conscious and

unconscious within the self of the other; a burdening of an aspiration to modernity. This angst is played outin the space of the other, in its constructs, its conflict with memory and its seemingly unfulfilled definition ofa physical reference to place aspirations on.

Again it is useful to return to natural synthesis in the words of Uche Okeke the key work is synthesis and Iam tempted to describe it as natural synthesis for it should be unconscious not forced

x. This statement

presumes that a philosophical resolution of the imposed and located has occurred in the mind of the

individual, for the synthesis to be without contrivance and therefore successful. This seems to be aweakness of the ideology, as its success is dependent on a corporate will to resolve this, and assumes acoherent awareness of these polarities as fact by the contemporary African. However it is useful to

remember that the contemporary African located and dispersed are collectively preoccupied with a resolutionof this issue through the attainment of individual aspirations to a construct that is perpetuated through adominant global media environment. Their energies are occupied with realising their aspirations through the

mimesis of imagery sourced from without. The content as consumed is consciously appropriated through theperceived dysfunction of their seemingly incoherent modernity, and thus the resultant product derived in thismanner, can be read as unresolved or in flux. It is the profound starkness of this reality which sets thebackdrop for Demas Nwokos work and endows it with an authority as a concrete reference for a critical


4/8

process of enquiry; a querying and subsequent synthesis that is not at odds with the crisis at the centre of

the psyche of the contemporary African, the crisis of duality and its resolution.

Production of Architecture

In 1967 Demas Nwoko set about establishing his first experiment, New Culture Studios at Oremeji in theUniversity town of Ibadan where he lectured in Theatre Arts. For him this was to be a place where the ideacould evolve and did evolve from the theoretical position of Natural Synthesis and produce a New Culturewhich in its totality would form the basis for a modern Nigerian society. Under the New Culture banner aphrase which Demas Nwoko coined, he intended that Natural Synthesis would feed into Theatre, Sculpture,dance, painting, furniture, product design and architecture; the totality of cultural production. New Culture

Studios provided Demas Nwoko with the opportunity to take Natural Synthesis into the spatial realm; andarchitecture to be informed by the simple idea. He had taken a conscious position on materiality that involvedusing appropriate materials and systems; questioning the practice of rendering concrete block work by a

hybrid local material he called Latcrete. There had been experiments with a cement/sand/laterite block thathe was aware of whilst at the Public Works Department, after experimenting with the system, he tested it outat Oremeji. In an interview with John Godwin, he describes his experiment and production of latcrete; as Icleared the land, I noticed that the earth was mixed with a lot of gravel and pieces of broken stone. I thought

that if I mixed the cement with this type of earth, the result could be a type of concrete since it containedsand and gravel. The resultant concrete would be stronger than normal sandcrete blocks, I thought. I built ametal block mould and cast a sample of my mix [using a proportion of 10% of Portland cement] the result

was astonishing, confirming my expectation Thus encouraged, I invited a local blockmaker to massproduce the blocks just substituting washed sand with the earth on the site. The saving was about half thecost of regular [sandcrete] blocks

xi. Most importantly he developed a specific attitude to space around

meaning and materiality referencing traditional architecture not purely for motifs, but somehow distilling themeaning of elements he deemed appropriate and articulating these concerns with the techniques of themodern. By the time he started domestic buildings, he had evolved simple guidelines for a comfortablehouse;

xii

These revolved around

Passive environmental control

Modulation of light

Occupying the building skin

Recognising the realities of the pre industrial society typical of Africa, Demas Nwoko sought to establish arural based production centre the African Designs Development Centre in 1978 in his home town Idumuje

Ugboko, The Idumuje Ugboko Experiment. His words We found that being far away from cities, we had toestablish a metal works section to handle our maintenance and spare parts sourcing as well as produce theconstruction steel frames we will need for our buildings

xiii. He clearly viewed his role as one of the master

builder tasked with delivering a built product to the client. Having fabrication facilities meant that he was ableto assert a degree of control over the production of components at the workshops of the African DesignDevelopment Centre.

Louis Kahn observed that I sense Light as the giver of all presences, and material as spent light. What Lightmakes casts a shadow and the shadow belongs to Light

xiv, this statement placing materiality as an issue in a

revisionist discourse of modern architecture. In experiencing the work of Demas Nwoko, one is confronted

with the nature of material, a revealing to the senses, that positions the whole as one that is beyond a meresuperficial attempt to evolve difference. This work, in its consequent revealing, communicates coherence inthe critical stance which he has taken. His stance being a conscious positioning, that continuously seeks anengaging of the located sources of material possibilities. It can be conveniently placed within the genre thatthe architectural historian, Kenneth Frampton describes as Critical Regionalism within the cannon ofModern architecture. However one must be careful, in hastily placing a critical position as this within thisaccepted definition, Critical Regionalism is a logical appropriation of Modernism located, a term that I feel,

would be convenient to apply to the work of the British Modernists in West Africa; Maxwell Fry and JaneDrew, John Godwin and Gillian Hopwood, James Cubbitt and Alan Vaughan-Richards. The divergence of

Demas Nwoko occurs in its origins within the avant-garde nationalist resistance in the guise of the aptly titledZaria Rebels of the pre independence Zaria Art School and the subsequent grouping of Mbari. The

philosophical position of this resistance demonstrates a rigour which became consistent in its expression


5/8

through texts, painting, sculpture and space. A rigour that allowed the individual to be participant in this very

universal act of critiquing of the status quo; a process, which can be argued lies at the heart of Modernity;viewed not as a stasis point to be reached or epoch, but purely as process. It is in the manner of synthesis oftraditional and of modern and its leaning not toward to the imposed, but to a resultant aesthetic andtexture that is resonant of the essence of a located culture in Demas Nwokos work that we get a coherent

view of a society that may be accepted as undergoing its own process of modernity. Hilde Heynen describesthe essence of Modernity as; ..stands for the attitude toward life that is associated with a continuous processof evolution and transformation, with an orientation toward the future that will be different from the past and

the present..xv

, this process has however culminated in a European template of Modernisation as a set ofconcrete targets that validate the process. Perhaps Demas Nwoko rejects this; the prevalent model ofmodernisation and as the artist is courageous enough to subject the functional requirements of dwelling to

the questions raised by Natural Synthesis, i.e. whose modernity is it?

Demas Nwokos spaces have taken the universality of daylight and recast its qualities and meaning within apalette which is at home but provocative to the sensibilities of the dual man that is the contemporary African.

It places at the fore a suppressed memory; confronting a multitude of brutalised psyches with the possibilityof a renegotiation of their position. In essence his work may be placed as a component of a restorativeprocess that acknowledges the fact of an unconscious which co-exists within the tendencies of thisaspiration. This act of critical production marks a concretizing of the flux that a refusal to accept the subtle

suprematist attitudes that underscore the colonial encounter clearly described by Edward Said as; Yet the

whole point of what Kurtz and Marlow talk about is in fact imperial mastery, white Europeans over blackAfricans and their ivory, civilization over the primitive dark continent.xvi

The act can be said to depart from

the text to complete the renegotiation of balance, moving it from the purely abstract and perhaps transientrealm of cultural commodification to a built reality. Demas Nwoko articulates his critical stance from withinthis crisis of African Modernity thus; Our appropriate technology is the ones we can build within our present

resources to serve our immediate needs and advance them to fulfil our future economic needs, our presenteconomy demands that our production be labour intensive, so automated systems will be counter productivein the long run. If technology is finding solution to problems of effective production, appropriate technologyevolves with design solutions to local resource utilization.

xvii, he engages further with the process of

production as one of constant experimentation as a bridge between the cerebral and practical. The utility oftechnology is placed not as rhetoric in an aspiring to the modern or nationalist aspirations of selfdetermination, but in its potent position within the vocabulary of societal development. He set up workshopsto feed the product of built space, acknowledging the inherent deficiency of manufacture and supply present

in Nigeria. This ensured a control over design content, making the often Herculean task of interpreting designquality into construction simpler and effective. This integration offers the potential to demystify the product,

as a component of Eurocentric modernisation, thereby permitting the participation of the located in thenegotiation of output; a negotiation, which has resulted in a sub conscious redefinition of modernization. Anaspiration to that has plagued post-colonial African society.

Description of Built Work

Dominican Church Chapel, Ibadan

Demas Nwoko was commissioned to build the Dominican Church Chapel and Monastery in Ibadan. Thisbuilding commission originally came as one to design an altar piece for the Dominican Community in Ibadan,Demas Nwoko managed to convince the client he could do a larger commission i.e. the entire complex. The

Dominican Community wanted something to reflect the African location and had rejected a previous designby another architect in 1966. Work began in 1970, the chapel consecrated in 1973, further work continued till1975 and minor additions are still being made by Demas craftsmen based in his New Culture studio inIbadan.

The building sits on slight incline in green manicured lawns with a striking tower rising over the main building

seemingly gathering the base volume in taut sinews to a slender peak. Demas Nwoko desired a compactform and explored the theatrical relationship of worship between the clergy and congregation. He paralleledChristian worship in the African context with the relationship between performance and the audience and thisinformed the plan form of the building. The altar is placed within the intersection of minor and major sector

that forms the compact plan of the building this is then separated from the congregations concentric circlesof pews by the choir. A semi circle of elaborately carved columns formally denote this transition. A concreteshell tower rises over the altar tapering as it rises, with an aluminium roof falling away midway from thetower. A sacristy lies on a central axis with entrance doors on either side; the subdivided major sector has


6/8

two garden pools that flank the entrance porch leading into the building. A circulation zone between the back

of the pews and the garden pool acts as a gathering space by the congregation before and after serviceevoking the animating of interstitial spaces in traditional African buildings and courtyards.

The language of this building is expressive; a sculptural statement on the kinetic potential relationships

between horizontal and vertical. The sculptor in Demas Nwoko produces an external line of columnsreminiscent of tree trunks with shorn branch stubs, but it is on the tower that this sculptural expression ismost potent. Tapering concrete water spouts project in 3 directions between structural flank walls, within the

tower are stairs up to the first floor. The materiality of the concrete shell structure is left as struck from theshuttering, the infill walls are omitted above the second level revealing a skeletal pyramid with the verticalspouts reinforcing each level and switch in articulation. At the apex of the tower sits a cross. This church

pulls together a central theme in the synthesis of Christianity in African society, the appropriating of symbolssign and ritual within the context of African mystical leanings. The extreme plastic expressionism that DemasNwoko resorts to is disciplined and evokes the surreal qualities of his paintings; the interconnectedness ofphysical and spiritual worlds that mark African mythology.

House in Idumuje Ugboko

Demas Nwoko decided to relocate to his village Idumuje Ugboko as part of his New Culture studios concept,

a creative studio network that encompassed all the arts.. His residence was of prime importance and workcommenced in 1976, the family moved in to the residence in 1979 and work continued with new parts being

added with time. His residence is located some 7 miles off the major east west highway that runs throughand between the ancient city of Benin and the large market city of Onitsha on the east bank of River Niger.Situated in the rainforest vegetative belt, the location of Idumuje Ugboko prompts a material palette that is

place specific; laterite based masonry systems and tropical hardwoods. The residence is mainly single storeywith a two-storey annexe at the western end. The plan is organised as a sequence of courtyards that rangein hierarchy of use from service to the inhabited. Demas Nwoko draws from the compound/ courtyardtraditional residential type, the functions which normally are concentrated in a single courtyard are separated

throughout the house. There are three entry possibilities, a formal front portico, an intermediate dailyentrance and a rear service entrance. They all connect directly or indirectly with courtyards. The servicecourtyard holds a water cistern, electrical generator and provides a utility surface for domestic work, it isenclosed by a patterned mud wall in traditional earth construction topped with a corrugated iron roofing

sheets, this opens onto a corridor adjacent to single rooms that surround another courtyard. Here the roomslead to an open space and provides accommodation for relatives. At the top of this hierarchy is a courtyard

around which the core family spaces are located. In this courtyard Demas Nwoko takes the impluviumfeature and condenses it into an iconic form, celebrating the primal function of water and light collection in atangible insertion that lifts the mundane compound to an ecclesiastical space. The walls are built in lateriteblocks, a system that utilises the red earth of the site as a substitute for sand in concrete block mix. The

laterite block external walls are left unfinished providing a durable surface that weathers naturally. To theeast of the central courtyard has a bank of coloured glass lights over the dining area, with bedroomsconnecting to this central lobby space. Demas Nwoko rejects a direct inside-outside visual dialogue,preferring instead to bounce light into the bedrooms through high level light shelves and ventilates the entirebuilding naturally via low and high level louvres. He is very clear in his attitude that landscape and interior inthis context should not be blurred. The annexe houses the artists private quarters comprising a studio, office

and bedroom on the first level, this room enjoys a completely louvred timber faade and a generous high

ceiling of a peaked roof.

Conclusion Natural Synthesis - New Culture - New Meaning

In thinking then about architecture for contemporary Africa, we must muse on the nature of exchange andthe notions of meaning, as the processes of mimesis that results from assigning value to that which isntreadily available or is distant will be subject to interpretation from meaning at source to assignedmeaning/value that either devalues or re-values what is appropriated. This process of value assignation inthe production of architecture obviously is a conscious act that should seek clues of meaning from within theexisting attitudes and filter what is brought from without. Architectural production specific to African spacewe think must then assess the meaning of the functional aspects of space constructs within the context of

the contemporary society. For instance, meaning of universal components that determine spatial quality likelight, material, public and private realms, scale and proportion and place offer possibilities to generate

language and vocabulary and attitudes that will be appropriate and lead to a quality of built environment thatmay be deemed as harmonious. This realisation led Demas Nwoko to assert that The house is a shade towhich man retreats. In this shade, man escapes the harsh tropical glare as well as the heat. The house is


7/8

thus a place to rest both the eye as well as the soul for the eye is the window to the soul.xviii

and the exterior

should not merge with the interior because both have distinct aesthetic attributes, which makes blendingboth artificial and uncalled for

xix. Why this appropriative framework of Natural Synthesis is attractive is the

insistence of critical assessment of what is sampled and redefined, why it becomes more relevant are thatDemas Nwokos experimental ideas bear testament to possibilities of critical enquiry into appropriateness

during the inevitable process of mimesis that is typical of current global cultural proliferation.

The conscious architect intervening in African space should probably ask questions of the value light, of

dark, of texture, of tectonics, of composition, of processes of component and build production that perhapsresult in specificity that maybe engenders the resulting built form with identity that may reflect theparticularities of contemporary African society. These particularities ideally are to be discovered through a

process of enquiry that will no doubt reveal what is appropriate. What is the meaning and hence the value ofthe European public park in contrast to the African market space as public realm? What is the meaning andvalue of the large window with a view inserted into the thin concrete skin of the dwelling sans shade?,looking out to the adjacent building both setback three metres from the boundary wall?

xx, The meaning of the

large window and the potential relationship with the outside is lost through the process of mimesis that oftenpilfers the image from the glossy magazine perused in the airport lounge or television and is imposedthrough the unthinking architect agent into the contemporary space of Africa. We can allude to the successof the western media machine in feeding aspirations to modernity through sets of predetermined imagery

relevant to post industrialised spaces as against the largely pre industrial spaces that constitute

contemporary Africa or we can lay a charge of failure to think hard about the universal principles ofArchitecture on contemporary African architects, or better still in best development speak attribute this

general failure to a lack of capacity. The last charge I prefer to avoid as all humanity essentially thinks andthus can deploy the cerebral if the will exists and perhaps if value is perceived or assigned of the products ofsuch endeavours. The question of meaning is one that must be foremost in the minds of the guardians of the

exchange within the built space i.e. the architect so the exchange is therefore not reduced to one ofconvenient mimesis.

iNnimmo Bassey; Essay titled The Archtecture of Demas Nwoko published on

http://www.baseconsulting.org/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=5iiColeman, James; Nigeria; Background to Nationalism, University of California Press, Berkeley and Los Angeles 1960. pg 317

iiiIbid, pg 411

ivOkeke, Uche; from his essay Natural Synthesis written in 1960, two years after the formation of the influential Zaria Arts Society to

which Demas Nwoko was a founding member. Art in Development A Nigerian Perspective; Asele Institute, Nimo, Nigeria, 1982. pg 2v

ibidvi

Negri, Antonio and Hardt Michael; Empire, Harvard University Press 2001. pg 76vii

See Andrew Apters splendid book; The Pan African Nation; Oil and the Spectacle of Culture in Nigeria, for an indepth examination onthe production of national culture in Nigeria around the Second World Black and African Festival of Arts and Culture. The University ofChicago Press 2005.viii

Nwoko Demas, The Impoverished Generation, pg 4. para 2. New Culture publications 1992.ix

Okeke Uche, Art in development A Nigerian perspective pg 2. Asele Institute & African American Cultural Center 1982x

ibidxi

Godwin John and Hopwood Gillian, Architecture of Demas Nwoko, to be published by Kachifo Books December 2007. Quote takenfrom 2006 draft.

xiiDike, Chike Paul & Oyelola, Pat ( Editors); The Zaria Art Society. National Gallery of Art of Nigeria, 1998. pg 108

xiii

Nwoko, Demas; The Impoverished Generation The Poor Mans Clean Rags, New Culture Publications, Asaba 1992. pg 126.xivKahn, Lous; Essential Texts edited by Robert Twombly; from the essay Silence and Light [1968 1969]; W.W.Norton & Company, New

York, 2003. pg 228xv

Hilde, Heynen; Architecture and Modernity, pg 9, para 2 . MIT Press 1999.xvi

Said Edward; Culture and Imperialism, pg 33 para 1. Vintage 1993xvii

Nwoko Demas, The Impoverished Generation, pg 146. para 2. New Culture publications 1992.xviii

Nnimmo Bassey; ibid.xix

Nnimmo Bassey; ibidxx

This set back requirement is typical of building codes in Nigeria, a colonial legacy yet to be challenged or critically assessed.

+++++++++++++++++++++++

This paper has been published on Scribd by the BUKKA TRUST [2013]


8/8

bukkaFacilitating a dialogue on spatial issues through a variety of prisms:

cultural, art, literary and the more conventional forms of architectural and urban notation.

towards a new culture; rethinking the african modern – the architecture of demas nwoko. by giles...

Documents