Adebisi Akanji: Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man

Master artist, Akanji Adebisi is shown working on the Iledi Ontotoo Shrine complex in the early years. Originally a bricklayer and creator of cement ornamentation on Brazilian style houses, he came into his own as a member of the New Sacred Art Movement - as a cement sculptor and close collaborator to Susanne Wenger - her co-creator on many large sculptures in the Osun Grove. He had been trained as a young man to build cement decorations for the elaborate Brazilian baroque building style derived from buildings introduced to West Africa in the late 19th century by former slaves. He participated in art workshops run by Ulli Beier, Georgina Beier and Wenger in the early 1960s and showed enormous interest and talent. She then invited him to work with her to create the monumental sculptures in the Groves, eventually working with her over many decades, a collabortion that allowed him to develop his incredible artistic talent to the highest level.
Wenger described their process: "I give Adebisi the story, the association he needs. With my hands he expresses the forms. I never draw a plan. Adebisi then portrays my gestures with the wall and pillars he raises in red mud and cement. I let him work for some hours by himself. Often his work expresses exactly what I have in mind. Sometimes I tell him we must start again. This never upsets him. He is always ready to listen again. He always comes back with new enthusiasm." (The Return of the Gods, Ulli Beier, p.92.)
Akanji also helped Wenger understand how to work with cement, a skill he acquired in his time as a bricklayer. In addition to his works of art in the Grove, he has applied his artistic talent to batiks, sensitive drawings in pen and ink and paintings. In an illustrious career, he was in great demand for commissioned work which included: The National Black Theatre in Harlem, New York City; The Centre for the former President, Obasanjo, in Abeokuta, Nike Art Gallery in Abuja and Osogbo, as well as Mydrim Gallery and private houses in Lagos. He has exhibited widely in Europe, the USA and in Brazil; and his work is held in private collections around the world.
Remarkably, Adebisi Akanji developed the talent of his son, Nurudeen, who shares his father’s flair for working in cement. Adebisi Nurudeen had by 2018 become the lead artist for the Restoration work in the Grove, when ill-health prevented Adebisi-the-elder from continuing the work. Until then, Adebisi Akanji had from 2008 played an extremely important leadership role in the restoration of the cement sculptures and monuments in the Sacred Groves. He is a traditionalist and leader within the Ogboni Cult.