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In the Studio: Yinka Shonibare

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Yinka Shonibare

30/11/2021 GMT

BBC World Service - In the Studio, Yinka Shonibare

The acclaimed artist creates a residency space and organic farm in Nigeria

Acclaimed British-Nigerian artist Yinka Shonibare works to create a residency space and organic farm in Nigeria.

World renowned British-Nigerian artist Yinka Shonibare has art work exhibited across the globe, but for this project, he’ll be swapping international museum spaces and his trademark, brightly coloured wax batik fabric for a wild, rural landscape and some altogether more industrial materials.

Reporter Nicola Humphries joins Yinka Shonibare as work begins on one of his most ambitious projects yet, the Ecology Green Farm. A residency space for artists, agriculturists and researchers, created with a sustainable infrastructure and food security for the local community in mind.

We’ll hear from Yinka in his studio in London, and from his collaborator, architect and master planner Papa Omotayo, on the ground in Lagos, as they work together to establish an organic farm across a 54-acre site whilst overseeing their team of local artisans handmake 40,000 bricks to construct a state-of-the art, artists residence and workshop. Gardens will be planted, greenhouses filled and local craft will take centre stage.

Across the year they’ll navigate lockdowns and rainy seasons, and gradually witness the centrepiece to this project, a locally styled barn house, rise from the ground, ready to become a place for people to share skills and ideas in an ambitious cultural exchange programme.

Yinka shares his personal motivations for establishing the Ecology Green Farm and explains his ongoing beliefs in the relationship between art and social justice, demonstrating with this project, how the combined disciplines of architecture and science can contribute to local eco systems, food security and of course, creativity.

Produced by Nicola Humphries

Additional sound recordings by Awa Osu

Photo: Yinka Shonibare CBE RA (Courtesy the artist and Royal Academy of Arts, London. Photographed by Marcus Leith, 2014)

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