By: Bamijoko Favour

The Backdrop

It is nothing but tragic how Ibadan collapsed from the status it acquired in the mid-twentieth century as the literary empire of not just Nigeria, but of West Africa, to its current state where it is only tottering on its way to find substantial literary relevance and cultural renaissance in Nigeria.

In the mid-twentieth century, after the founding of the University College, Ibadan, Ibadan became very much alive with many professional literati amongst whom are some household names — Achebe, Okigbo, Soyinka, Osundare, Osofisan, Mabel Segun, Ofeimun — and many others from what one could call the second and third generation of writers who were in their bloom, obsessed with making arts, in all its forms.

There were the foreign expatriates too. A number of whom prioritized extramural activities (outside-the-school activities) over University-based curriculum. There was the German, Uli Beier, whose influence on Nigerian art and artists cannot be overlooked; it was he who founded Black Orpheus in 1957 and published the works well-known African writers like kofi Awoonor, Senghor, and the likes; there was the culture-centric film maker, Frank Speed, who grew concerned with visually documenting Yoruba festivals and practices; Geoffery Axworthy, the founder of Nigeria’s first School of Drama; Robert Gardiner, director of extramural studies at the University of Ibadan, amongst others, many of whom began first within the University College but sooner expanded their reach, and artistic spirits beyond the walls of the University, reaching Yoruba towns like Erin Osun, Osogbo, etc.

Still on this historic thoroughfare, there was the Mbari House, or Mbari Club, formed by Uli Beier. The club served as a hub for writers, thespians, musicians, and other talents. The influence of the group reached Osogbo and stretched to as far as the Caribbeans in the twentieth century. Apart from Soyinka, Okigbo, Achebe, there were also, within the club, J. P. Clark, Ezekiel Mphahlele, Amos Tutuola, Frances Ademola, Demas Nwoko, Mabel Segun, Uche Okeke, Arthur Nortje and Bruce Onobrakpeya. It was through the Mbari House that artists like Demas Nwoko found more prominence for their craft which combined Afro-conscious forms with European influence; through the Mbari press and publishing arm, more writers found expression, and artistic development.

Of course, the artistic scope of Ibadan in the late twentieth century extended beyond literary-based art forms. As stated above, there were artists and designers like Demas Nwoko who were preoccupied with fine art and architectural designs. Two of his most important architectural designs, New Culture Studio, and Culture Centre, have been architectural marvels for years now, especially as a result of how the architect combined foreign expressions with national forms (even the Dominican University, and his now-destroyed mural at Tedder Hall, equally here in Ibadan, holds/held much intrigue for observers). As a stage designer, he designed the stage for Wole Soyinka’s A Dance of the Forest; New Culture Studio was designed, to, in part, provide a workspace for designers, and artists like Nwoko himself and to accommodate other art forms; while Culture Centre was designed to accommodate the extension from the Festival of Arts and Culture that happened in Lagos, 1977.

Popularly renowned as the Father of Modern Art in Nigeria, Ben Enwonwu was trained here in Ibadan. Enwonwu studied fine art at Government College, Ganga, Ibadan, learning from Kenneth C. Murray, arts illustrator. Ibadan, at present, houses his most applauded work, the Risen Christ, currently gathering dust at the Chapel of Resurrection, University of Ibadan.

There was the University of Ibadan Choir, and the Nigerian Broadcasting Corporation Choir, led by the eminent Christopher Oyesiku. His contributions, and efforts could be said to be one of the distant factors that brought about the department of Music, University of Ibadan.There was the buoyant printmaking art and industry from where Bruce Onobrakpeya would learn printmaking. For those who may not know, Bruce Onobrakpeya was also a redefining figure in the understanding and development of Nigerian art. An illustrator, printmaker, painter and sculptor, he and Nwoko and a select few espoused the principle of “Natural Synthesis.” There was the Nigerian Broadcasting Corporation (NBC).

The School of Drama, University of Ibadan cannot go unmentioned. Indeed, it must not. The School of Drama, University of Ibadan, was established in 1962 by Geoffrey Axworthy and one Martin Banhan, after receiving a Rockefeller grant. It was a novel establishment in sub-Saharan Africa. In no time, they produced Soyinka’s The Swamp Dwellers, Lion and the Jewel and A Dance of the Forest. These productions rapidly catalysed the theatre industry in Ibadan. Soyinka would become its first head of department in 1970 when it became a department. The School of Drama saw the development of influential thespians like Jimi Solanke, whom CNN described as the ‘master storyteller’; Abiola Irele (who acted the role of Lakunle in the first production of Soyinka’s Lion and the Jewel, 1958; Kola Ogunmola, who was famed across Africa for his theatrics in the 1950’s; he adapted Amos Tutuola’s ‘Palmwine Drinkard’, formed the Ogunmola Travelling Theatre and equally pioneered Yoruba folk opera; there were many more — Kunle Bamtefa, who studied theatre; Sam Loco, who although studied political science, was a renowned Nollywood actor before his death etc. — who went on to propagate the gospel of art in new ways.

Importantly at the time, the inception of the University College, Ibadan, at Ibadan, attracted intellectuals, intelligentsia, renowned literati, and several scholars and expatriates to the City, including Adunni Olorisha (Susanne Wenger). This transformed the city into the intellectual firepower it was. And these crops of intellectuals fed the civil and public service with quality materials for instructional and institutional development, a necessity missing amongst the rank-and-file of today’s civil and public service in the State. People who were knowledgeable about the dynamics of the parastatal they administered.

The Problem

In the intellectual era of Ibadan, arts and cultural developments improved strongly owing to the intelligent and brilliant minds that populated the city. People who understood what arts and cultural developments entailed; who understood the demands of being artists; who institutionalized art and cultural developments. Hence, Peter Benson noted that Ibadan University would “produce an intellectual élite that in time will dominate the new society.”

In his piece, ‘Nigeria: A History of Ibadan Art – Ibadan As Nigeria’s Art, Culture and Intellectual Hub’, Tunde Adegbola notes that The establishment of self-government in the Western Region of Nigeria in 1952, preparatory to independence in 1960 necessitated the development of a civil service and a secretariat. The secretariat was strategically located near the university so that the civil service could benefit from the intellectual atmosphere of the university. Both of these institutions having been built far from the old Ibadan city, the quest to promote interaction between the university community and the civil service was enhanced by the construction of Bodija Housing Estate as the first of its kind in Africa. It was deliberately situated between the University College and the secretariat. So started the breeding of a new civil service elite and a learned gentry, providing the building blocks of what made Ibadan an art and culture hub in Nigeria of the 60s and beyond.”

The University’s products and proponents heavily influenced the civil service elites. Peter Benson wrote, about Ibadan, in his work ‘Black Orpheus, Transition, and Modern Cultural Awakening in Africa’, that there was “an eagerness to move ahead, a confidence in the future that was symbolized in the modern facilities of Ibadan’s new university. Like Khartoum’s Gordon College and Kampala’s Makerere, Gunther predicted, Ibadan University would “produce an intellectual élite that in time will dominate the new society.” Such was the nature of the civil society and the public service that administered the regulations of cultural developments in Ibadan.

According to Beier, as documented by Benson, he was assisted by the ministry in terms of funding, in terms of logistics and the distribution of Black Orpheus magazine (to the extent that it reached South Africa), and printing problems. There was substantial institutional support. It was this institutional support that saw the University College support the many extramural activities ongoing around Ibadan

Sadly, that band of think tanks has thinned out from the public service. It appears that many of those who make up the rank-and-file of that agency responsible for the development of arts and culture as well as tourism are people who are merely part of the bureaucratic job-holding-class who hold positions not for systemic service, but for mere job-holding purposes to pay the taxes of life; people who have no real connection with arts and cultural developments (Philistines, if you may) and owing to this disconnect, spend time chasing shadows and issues on the margin of real cultural, artistic promptings; a good number of them are merely influencers, parish politicians and politicians-in-embryo who devise the post to harvest popularity; and if at all there are genuine folks amongst them interested in arts, they constitute the minority who in any case cannot make any meaningful impacts.

Spending time and resources dealing with issues, events that are well detached from the realities of the artists, of arts, and substantial cultural developments in the state, they come up with masquerade events like ‘creative mixers’, “festivals” and events of similar outlook targeted at gathering crowds and creative-adjacents where they wine and dine (and of course, pretend to deal with issues of artistic parlance). No, not that these festivals and gatherings do not, or may not, have their significance. But they do not substantially improve the situation.

It appears that the regeneration of real artistic redevelopment is hamstrung by a sort of disconnect, on the part of policy makers, with the calibre of historical antecedents Ibadan holds. Or, at best, they have only a superficial knowledge of it — and this is the condition of many students, and even adults and creatives. Only a superficial, surface-value grasp is held, but not the real understanding of the efforts, and type of socio-cultural activities laid down in the past..

This environment, so to call it, is particularly a harrowing one for the artist (or creative). The realities and daily demands of the artists are different from those of the common man. It is unique, and unpredictable, as art can be. It is this unpredictability that makes the notion of who the artist is a tough nut to crack. So far, the policy makers responsible for this charge have shown, through what they have done, or not done, a failure to articulate the idea of who the artist is. And implicitly, what is befitting to the artist or creative.

On the other hand, the economic cost of things is relentlessly rising. And this rise does not forgive the artist. In fact, one could say they are one of those who are significantly affected. Because the raw materials needed by artists are rare, and because artistic ‘products’ do not have a democratic value similar to popular items like food items, materials required by artists and creatives are significantly expensive and many times inaccessible. As such, the industry suffers from harsh economic frostbites when governmental support (financially and policy-wise) is wanting.

The spatial aspects of the discipline reveal the same decline or decay. The Nwoko’s Culture Centre has not exactly been put to credible use for a cobweb-gathering spell of time. It is populated by strays and wanderers, alongside bike men, who find shelter in the nooks of the construction. No serious artistic performance or engagement has occurred within the premises in a while. At New Culture Studio, while the facility is well in use, it is managed by private individuals (family of the founding architect). And even at that, it is far-from completion. Bowers Tower, a tourist-based centre, is slipping into ruins. Maybe not the tower, but its surrounding facilities. One could go on and on pointing out physical infrastructural deficits. Deficits clearly explaining why cultural and artistic regeneration is proving to be an uphill task in Ibadan.

Directly or indirectly, it is this problem on the part of policy makers that is responsible for the stunted growth of creative arts and entertainment in the University of Ibadan. Almost, clearly, the students are not made to see any real support nor benefit (within their local environment) for or of involving in arts, or any related practices. With little to no impetus from the government, students who, by the nature of their discipline or talents have to engage with arts, have to plumb the depths of their wits for funding, support and sponsorship.

The Solution

Without really talking about it, any well-informed person should have an idea on what needs to be done to inject the needed impetus into the development of art, entertainment and culture in Ibadan; including tourism. There is a strong need for institutional support. This institutional support must begin from the human factor. In this sense, only people who are artists, or members of the literati, who understand the idea of the artists, and the craft of the artists, as well as the artists’ surrounding realities should be made policy makers.

Notwithstanding the jejune status quo, Ibadan has continued to produce, or house, remarkably talented, and forward-thinking individuals who are creatives or artists. In 2015, two students from UI Habeeb Kolade and Dolapo Amusat came together to start a collective, UITES WRITE; from that collective would come Agbowó Art Magazine. There’s Adedayo Agarau who has been a Cave Canem Fellow, 2023, Wallace Stegner Fellow ‘25 and is equally the EIC, Agbowó Art (amongst other awards to his name. There is the awesome indie artist, Tega Ethan, who has been producing poetic songs for a fair amount of time in Ibadan. There is the Beautiful Nubia, an alumnus of the University of Ibadan. There are digital and fine artists like Erivic, the convener of Comicon, Ibadan. Within the University of Ibadan are several talented artists of diverse forms, singers, songwriters, creatives, and the likes. One only needs to look.

Beyond the facade of hangouts and festivals, policy makers must create structured plans for the development of arts and entertainment in Ibadan, and Oyo State at large. Blueprints for institutional support like collaborative efforts between Universities and magazines should be created. Efforts like this are responsible for sustaining old magazines in Europe and America. The point is, literary growth, art and cultural development cannot be achieved by mere performances alone. It can only come about by visible, blueprint and policies.

Of course, it need not be told — tourist spots should be revamped. Residencies, and reserved areas should be created to cater for the needs of artists and creatives. Government funds, sponsorship should be made available and accessible to creatives with defined plans and consistent track record. More so, government subsidies, or policies should be made to control the prices of materials required by creatives. In fact, policy makers can effectively court the attention, and support of foreign or external foundations given to supporting creatives.

More diligent primary works need to be done to create institutional and sustain support for the artist and creative within this city. It is only then that the literary glory of Ibadan can be rightfully restored — and it must.