Chika Okeke-Agulu () is a Nigerian artist, art historian, art curator, and blogger specializing in African and
African diaspora art history. He lives in Princeton, New Jersey.
Biography
Chika Okeke-Agulu was born in
Umuahia
Umuahia () is the capital city of Abia State in southeastern Nigeria. Umuahia is located along the rail road that lies between Port Harcourt to its south,and Enugu city to its north. Umuahia has a population of 359,230 according to the 2006 Nige ...
in
Nigeria
Nigeria ( ), , ig, Naìjíríyà, yo, Nàìjíríà, pcm, Naijá , ff, Naajeeriya, kcg, Naijeriya officially the Federal Republic of Nigeria, is a country in West Africa. It is situated between the Sahel to the north and the Gulf o ...
in 1966. He studied at the
University of Nigeria, Nsukka
The University of Nigeria, commonly referred to as UNN, is a federal university located in Nsukka, Enugu State, Eastern part of Nigeria. Founded by Nnamdi Azikiwe in 1955 and formally opened on 7 October 1960, the University of Nigeria has th ...
(BA, First Class Honors, Sculpture and Art History, 1990; MFA, Painting, 1994),
University of South Florida
The University of South Florida (USF) is a public research university with its main campus located in Tampa, Florida, and other campuses in St. Petersburg and Sarasota. It is one of 12 members of the State University System of Florida. USF i ...
(MA, Art History, 1999), and
Emory University
Emory University is a private research university in Atlanta, Georgia. Founded in 1836 as "Emory College" by the Methodist Episcopal Church and named in honor of Methodist bishop John Emory, Emory is the second-oldest private institution of ...
(PhD, Art History, 2004).
Okeke-Agulu taught at the
Yaba College of Technology
Yaba College of Technology, popularly known as YABATECH, was founded in 1947, and is Nigeria's first higher educational institution. It is located in Yaba, Lagos. It has a student enrollment of over 16,000.
Overview
Yaba College of Technology ...
in
Lagos
Lagos (Nigerian English: ; ) is the largest city in Nigeria and the second most populous city in Africa, with a population of 15.4 million as of 2015 within the city proper. Lagos was the national capital of Nigeria until December 1991 fo ...
, the University of Nigeria, Nsukka,
Penn State University, and was the Clark Visiting professor at
Williams College
Williams College is a private liberal arts college in Williamstown, Massachusetts. It was established as a men's college in 1793 with funds from the estate of Ephraim Williams, a colonist from the Province of Massachusetts Bay who was kill ...
. He is Director of the Program in African Studies, Director of Africa World Initiative, and Professor of Art History in the Department of Art and Archaeology and the Department of African American Studies at
Princeton University
Princeton University is a private research university in Princeton, New Jersey. Founded in 1746 in Elizabeth as the College of New Jersey, Princeton is the fourth-oldest institution of higher education in the United States and one of the ...
. In spring 2020 he was appointed the Kirk Varnedoe Visiting professor at the
Institute of Fine Arts
The Institute of Fine Arts (IFA) of New York University is dedicated to graduate teaching and advanced research in the history of art, archaeology and the conservation and technology of works of art. It offers Master of Arts and Doctor of Philos ...
,
New York University
New York University (NYU) is a private research university in New York City. Chartered in 1831 by the New York State Legislature, NYU was founded by a group of New Yorkers led by then- Secretary of the Treasury Albert Gallatin.
In 1832, th ...
. In 2022 he was appointed
Slade Professor of Fine Art
The Slade Professorship of Fine Art is the oldest professorship of art and art history at the universities of Cambridge, Oxford and University College, London.
History
The chairs were founded concurrently in 1869 by a bequest from the art collect ...
,
Oxford University
Oxford () is a city in England. It is the county town and only city of Oxfordshire. In 2020, its population was estimated at 151,584. It is north-west of London, south-east of Birmingham and north-east of Bristol. The city is home to th ...
(2022-2023), and was elected Corresponding Fellow of
The British Academy
The British Academy is the United Kingdom's national academy for the humanities and the social sciences.
It was established in 1902 and received its royal charter in the same year. It is now a fellowship of more than 1,000 leading scholars span ...
.
He was a writer and columnist for ''
The Huffington Post
''HuffPost'' (formerly ''The Huffington Post'' until 2017 and sometimes abbreviated ''HuffPo'') is an American progressive news website, with localized and international editions. The site offers news, satire, blogs, and original content, and ...
'', and blogs at ''Ọfọdunka''. He has served on the Board of Directors of College Arts Association, and currently on the board of Princeton in Africa, the Transnational Board of Tate-Hyundai Research Centre,
Tate Modern
Tate Modern is an art gallery located in London. It houses the United Kingdom's national collection of international modern and contemporary art, and forms part of the Tate group together with Tate Britain, Tate Liverpool and Tate St Ives. It ...
, and on the advisory board of the Africa Institute, Sharjah. He is a member of the Contemporary Art Committee,
Philadelphia Museum of Art.
He received the College Art Association 2016 Frank Jewett Mather Award for Distinction in Art Criticism. He is the recipient, from African Studies Association, of the 2016 Melville J. Herskovits Award for the most important scholarly work in African Studies published in English in 2015, and Honorable Mention, The Arnold Rubin Outstanding Publication Award, from the Art Council of African Studies Association (2017).
Curator
Curated Uche Okeke 60th Birthday Anniversary Retrospective at the Goethe-Institut, Lagos. In 1995, he organized the Nigerian section of the First Johannesburg Biennale and co-organized ''Seven Stories about Modern Art in Africa'' at the Whitechapel Art Gallery, London, and Malmö Konsthall, Malmö, Sweden. In 2001, he claimed to have worked on ''The Short Century: Independence and Liberation Movements in Africa, 1945–1994'', an exhibition curated by
Okwui Enwezor
Okwui Enwezor (23 October 1963 – 15 March 2019) was a Nigerian curator, art critic, writer, poet, and educator, specializing in art history. He lived in New York City and Munich. In 2014, he was ranked 24 in the ''ArtReview'' list of the 100 m ...
, at the Museum Villa Stuck, Munich, Haus der Kulturen der Welt/Martin Gropiusbau, Berlin, Museum of Contemporary Art, Chicago, and PS1/MOMA, New York. He claims to have served as an Academic Consultant and Coordinator of Platform 4, for Documenta11, Kassel in 2002. In 2004 he co-organized the 5th Gwangju Biennial and Strange Planet at the Georgia State University Art Gallery. He co-organized ''Life Objects: Rites of Passage in African Art'' for the Princeton University Art Museum in 2009, and (with Udo Kittelmann and Britta Schmitz), Who Knows Tomorrow, at the Nationalgalerie, Berlin, (June-Sept., 2010). In 2019, he co-organized (with Okwui Enwezor), ''El Anatsui: Triumphant Scale'' at
Haus der Kunst, Munich, MATHAF: Arab Museum of Modern Art, and Kunstmuseum, Bern.
Publications
Okeke-Agulu has published articles and reviews in ''Parkett'', ''African Arts'', ''Glendora Review'', ''Meridians: Feminism, Race, Transnationalism'', ''South Atlantic Quarterly'', ''Artforum International'', and ''Art South Africa''. He has contributed to edited volumes, including ''Reading the Contemporary: African Art from Theory to the Market Place'' (InIVA, 1999); ''The Nsukka Artists and Nigerian Contemporary Art'' (Smithsonian, 2002); ''The Short Century: Independence and Liberation Movement in Africa, 1945–1994'' (Prestel, 2001); ''Art Criticism and Africa'' (Saffron Books, 1998); and ''Is Art History Global?'' (Routledge, 2007). His books include ''El Anatsui: The Reinvention of Sculpture'' (Damiani, 2022), ''Yusuf Grillo: Painting. Lagos. Life'' (Skira, 2020), ''Obiora Udechukwu: Line, Image, Text'' (Skira, 2016), ''Postcolonial Modernism: Art and Decolonization in Twentieth-Century Nigeria'' (Duke UP, 2015), ''Contemporary African Art Since 1980'' (Damiani, 2009), ''Who Knows Tomorrow'' (Konig, 2010), ''Phyllis Galembo: Maske'' (Chris Boot, 2010), and ''Ezumeezu: Essays on Nigerian Art and Architecture, a Festschrift in Honour of Demas Nwoko'' (Goldline & Jacobs, 2012). He is editor of ''Nka: Journal of Contemporary African Art'', published by Duke University Press.
Exhibitions
As an artist, Okeke-Agulu has had three solo exhibitions, five joint exhibitions, and twenty-eight group exhibitions in England, Germany, Nigeria, South Africa, South Korea, Sweden, Switzerland, Trinidad and Tobago, and the United States. He participated in the First Johannesburg Biennale (1995). His work is in the collections of the Newark Museum, Iwalewa-Haus, University of Bayreuth, and the National Council for Arts and Culture, Lagos.
In 2020, Okeke-Agulu called on auction house
Christie's to cancel its planned Paris sale of two Igbo sculptures, which were stolen during the Nigeria-Biafra War (1967-1970).
The auction went ahead.
References
External links
Faculty webpagePersonal blog
Huffington Post column
{{DEFAULTSORT:Okeke-Agulu, Chika
1966 births
Living people
Nigerian bloggers
Nigerian artists
HuffPost writers and columnists
Igbo academics
University of Nigeria alumni
Yaba College of Technology faculty
Nigerian expatriate academics in the United States
Princeton University faculty
University of Nigeria faculty
Igbo artists
Emory University alumni
Nigerian art historians