Aina Onabolu

Aina Onabolu was born in 1882 in Ijebu Ode, in south-western Nigeria, to Jacob Onabolu, a successful merchant, and Oshunjente Onabolu, a trader. He taught himself at first by copying photographs and illustrations in European books and magazines, and began painting portraits in Lagos in the early 1900s, at a time when colonial officials doubted that Africans could practise art in the European manner. His careful, realistic portraits of the Lagos elite, such as Mrs Spencer Savage (1906; some sources call it Lady Spencer Savage), were a deliberate answer.

He studied at the Académie Julian in Paris and then in London, where he earned a certificate in oil painting and fine art between 1920 and 1922; sources name the London school differently. On his return he campaigned for art to be taught in Nigerian schools, teaching it himself at King's College and the CMS Grammar School in Lagos. His efforts led to the appointment of the British art teacher Kenneth Murray, who trained a generation that included Ben Enwonwu. Onabolu taught for decades and died in 1963 (one auction listing gives 1962).

How to look at an Onabolu: look at the care. The skin tones, the cloth and the furniture are painted with the finish of academic European portraits, and that finish was the argument; he used it to show that the sitters, and the painter, could be seen on those terms. That reading is this site's own.

His insistence that Nigerians could master any visual language prepared the ground for the modernists who followed.

Where to see the work

Onabolu's paintings are in Nigerian collections and archives; Google Arts & Culture shows some of his religious paintings, such as Bibeli Mimo. Ask the National Gallery of Nigeria and the museums in Lagos what is on display. See our lists of Nigerian painters and Nigerian artists.