In the town of Ijebu, Nigeria, you’ll find a thriving 54-acre working farm, cultivating an array of crops like cassava, cashew, pawpaw, peppers, and maize. Surprisingly, this farm serves as the home to one of two new non-profit artist and scientist residencies in Nigeria, a vision brought to life by YBA artist Yinka Shonibare CBE.
Known as the Ecology Green Farm, Shonibare’s brainchild was conceived in 2019 as part of his Guest Artists Space (G.A.S.) residencies program. The goal was to create a hub for artists, scientists, agriculturists, and researchers, fostering international cultural exchange and bridging Africa’s art markets with the global art community.
Shonibare acquired the farmland in 2018 and enlisted architect Papa Omotayo of MOE+ for the construction, with interior design by his niece, Temitayo Shonibare. The project maintained a strong commitment to sustainability, even using 40,000 bricks made from the soil excavated for its foundations.
Allotments were introduced to grow food for visiting artists, with the aim of making the farm entirely self-sustaining. Future plans include expanding the site, with the construction of four workshop buildings, dedicated to craft practices like weaving and ceramics, set to begin in 2023.
A sister residency site is located in Oniru, Lagos, featuring a modern structure that blends Brutalism with traditional Yoruba architectural elements, surrounding a central courtyard. Here, residents are encouraged to work on their projects and participate in cooking salons and technological research.
Since its completion in spring 2022, this Lagos site has hosted notable residents, including Lynhan Balatbat-Helbock, Femi Johnson, Emma Prempeh, Portia Zvavahera, and Gideon Gomo.
It also houses a library with over 1,500 volumes donated by Prof John Picton, focusing on African art and culture, which is in the process of digitization and will eventually be accessible to the public. The residency has also established partnerships with prominent art galleries.
Shonibare, who spent part of his youth in Lagos before pursuing studies in the UK, believes in giving back to the artistic community. He emphasizes his commitment to supporting younger artists, which is evident through these residencies.
For the past decade, Shonibare has operated Guest Projects from his London studio, providing emerging artists across various disciplines with a space to propose collaborations and experiment with new ideas. Unfortunately, the challenges posed by the global arts crisis compelled Guest Projects London to transition to a digital residency format in 2020.
The concept of these residencies has been brewing for quite some time, as Shonibare explains. “G.A.S. projects is a project space I started in London about 11 years ago.
Then I decided I wanted to make the project bigger. So, I registered my foundation and G.A.S. artists space foundation in Lagos, aiming to internationalize G.A.S. projects by creating a space for artists and researchers from around the world to undertake residencies in Africa.
