Tutu - A Portrait of Nigeria

Available for over a year

In 2018 the record price for a piece of Nigerian art was smashed. ‘Tutu’, a mysterious painting of a Nigerian princess, went under the hammer at Bonhams in Mayfair for £1.2 million. It was all the more mysterious because the work, by the Nigerian master Ben Enwonwu, had been considered lost for decades. Enwonwu was commissioned to make a sculpture of Queen Elizabeth and exhibited alongside Picasso in Paris, his work tapped into the spirit world of Nigeria and addressed the huge changes the country went through in his lifetime from colonisation to independence and civil war. However, although considered by many to be the most important African artist of the 20th century, Ben Enwonwu is far less well known outside Africa. Novelist Chibundu Onuzo pieces together the fascinating story behind ‘Africa’s Mona Lisa’ and explores the life of its creator. Producer Neil McCarthy