Preceded by a three day free exhibition of the works on sale, the year’s auction
of Modern and Contemporary African Art at Bonhams in London made for an
impressive harvest. It is a marketplace like any other but one uncelebrated
aspect of such sales is the single opportunity to see rare works and masterpieces –
some not seen for decades – all in the space of two hours. Majority of the sales
were conducted over the phone, a good portion of which were from Lagos,
Nigeria where Bonhams also has a representative, sent from its London office.
Held on March 20th, the total lot of 135 works that include paintings, sculptures
and water colours were assembled into 6 categories namely: South Africa, Ghana
& Nigeria, Central Africa, Mali & Cote D’Ivoire & Benin, East Africa and “Creative
Currents of the Nile” which was specially curated by Roubi L’ Roubi, a Sudanese
fashion designer and curator whose last show “Forests and Spirits: Figurative Art
From The Khartoum School” was held last year at Saatchi Gallery (UK).
Bonhams has long had success with it’s “South African Sale” and before the recent
swell of interest in west African artists best signified by the £1.2 million (est
£200-300) Ben Enwowu’s Tutu fetched at auction in February 2018.
To address the insufficient attention paid to master works by specific East African
artists, the auction house, along with curator L’ Roubi, conceived of “Creative
Currents of the Nile”. Most notable is Ibrahim El Salahi, Sudan’s most celebrated
living artist, as well as Salah El Mur, Alexander Boghossian, Hussein Shariffe,
Mohamed Abbaro, Siddig El Nigoumi and others deserving of great acclaim andhigh prices. The approach Bonhams is one L’ Roubi hails as “visionary for bringing
in east Africa”.
Hyperbole aside, the Bonhams auction has no doubt introduced buyers to some of
El Salahi’s works. His ink and whitewash titled Standing Figure (acquired in
Nigeria, circa 1960) had a modest estimate of £15 000 – 20 00 but went on to sell
for more than double the figure at £50.036. Only two other works in the top ten
best sellers sold for twice its projected figure namely Le Debut De Cheri Samba
by Congo’s Cheri Samba and Ladies Of The Harem, Zanzibar by South Africa’s
Irman Stern.
Enwowu’s elegant bronze sculpture of an Igbo goddess Anyanwu sold for £187.563
(est $100 – 150 000) while the supple and graceful painting of a woman wearing a
headscarf titled Negritude was the second best selling work at $137.563 (est £40 –
60). Enwowu’s The Fruit Seller was the fourth best at $125.063 (est £100 – 150).
Interest in his work has never been higher and is understandably driving the
prices of his lesser works, some of which start at just over £5000.
The strong performance by the artist did not come as a surprise, not least to
Giles Peppiatt, Head of African Modern and Contemporary Art at Bonhams who
believes the value of Enwowu’s works will only keep rising: “I mean you have to
look at what they were fetching 10 years ago, you could have bought an Enyawu
for as little as £2000”.
The second strongest sale was of works by Gerard Sekoto who Peppiatt regards as
“probably the most important Black South African artist”. Sekoto’s Washer
Woman (circa 1940), a depiction of two women in tranquil domesticity sold at£125 063 (est $100-150 000) while another oil painting, The Water Collectors
(1945-47), also by the artist was bought for £87.567 (est £50 – 80 000).
As auctioneer, Peppiatt has been instrumental in positioning Bonhams as a leader
in the sale of contemporary African art in the UK since he organisedthe auction
houses’ first sale in 2009. He describes the current state of the market as
“extremely fair and very strong” and has high hopes for the first New York edition
in May: “I fully expect that to perform well. For the moment I think things are
looking very rosy”.
Established in 1793, Bonhams is among the world’s largest auctioneers but L’
Roubi believes the success of its auctions of African art is not the result of
marketing expertise, as many of the featured artists are also included in other
contemporary sales. The main reason, he goes on to add, is that the “clarity and
rawness in the communication in the contemporary work from the continent is
connecting with people especially now equity the global challenges we have
everywhere, people just go back to this really human messages”