ROOM FOR HUMOUR

5^th Anniversary, Gallery ZAK, Fürth, 2000

[Invitation Archive 2000]  

[Twins Seven Seven (1944 – 2011)]

Fürther Nachrichten, 2000, MARGIT LANGENBERGER

In the sign of an exuberant creativity

The work of Twins Seven Seven for the fifth anniversary of Gallery ZAK - intricate pictures

His name isn't just the imaginative pseudonym of an artist. In fact, the name Twins Seven Seven symbolises that he as a Yoruba people was the only surviving child of seven pairs of twins. The Yoruba people believe in the individual’s ability to influence its destiny by willpower and proper observance of rituals. The twins are children of semi-divine origins and bring wealth and happiness for their family. According to their faith, his mother had born him seven times, until he finally "could be persuaded to stay".

With a solo exhibition of one of the most famous exponents of the contemporary African art scene, the gallery ZAK in Fürth celebrates its fifth anniversary. Twins Seven Seven a painter, musician, dancer, politician and entrepreneur is – as the name of the exhibition, "The fire is just too big", reveals – a person of seemingly tireless creative urge.

Except for some large-scale ink drawings on linen cloth, he works mainly with two superposed sheets of plywood, with the upper layer sawn out, finely figured and painted. So, that the whole piece looks similar to the unfoldable anatomical illustrations of old medical dictionaries.



As the Nigerian artist is convinced that the spirits of all the other twins are united in him, it is not surprising that he lives more intensely and creates with unbridled imagination more than the ordinary person. All of his works have the character of detailed filigree imagery.

These relief-like sculpture paintings have through this a mysterious depth, from where then a large number of African eyes stare. A particularly striking piece is Twins Seven Seven’s Secret Sex House that is a three feet high, rectangular, tapered box, which on the outside is decorated with images of dates, palm wine jugs, fruit bowls and houses. But anyone who looks into the inside through the hole is going to view erotic scenes, as to find in the Indian Tantric culture.

The art of the Nigerian is dominated by the African mythology. Whereby, he has also designed many fantasy figures that have little in common with the folk tradition.  Frequently appearing symbols in his paintings such as turtles, snakes and fish, are related to rituals of the Yoruba-cult.

There are also a number of artworks with gynaecological content, birth scenes and bloody rituals of circumcision of women. Their aestheticism doesn't reveal the artist's opinion. The huge painting of a fish-god with four heads in mixed media on canvas and a fantasy-bird with a long curved beak in his colourful plumage already seems a little more playful.



Twins Seven Seven relies on the power of prayer. His actions are always accompanied by rituals. "When I sometimes say, 'I pray to God', in truth I speak to the planet of Earth. I speak through the wind". And when he performs with his rock band he invokes the gods and generally identifies himself with Shango, the Yoruba god of thunder. It probably does not surprise that some one with 13 wives and about 50 children says about his own potential that he would soon go crazy if he just would give his energy one subject. The fire is simply too large and the heat would be too much for him.