His pictures are crowded with creatures: spirits with many heads, animals with human faces, gods and ghosts tangled together in dense, patterned scenes. The artist who made them called himself Twins Seven-Seven, and his work came out of an extraordinary moment in Nigerian art. In the 1960s, in the town of Osogbo, workshops encouraged local people with little formal training to make art. Twins Seven-Seven became one of the most famous artists to emerge, known internationally for his imaginative paintings and prints.
The name and the Osogbo workshops
He was born Taiwo Olaniyi Oyewale in the 1940s. He took the name Twins Seven-Seven because he was said to be the only survivor of seven sets of twins born to his mother. Osogbo, a Yoruba town in what is now Osun State, became a centre of artistic activity in the 1960s. The German scholar Ulli Beier and the artist Georgina Beier organised workshops in Osogbo, encouraging local people to paint, draw and print.
The Mbari Mbayo Club in Osogbo, linked to the Mbari Club in Ibadan, became a gathering place for artists, musicians and writers.
A performer and his fame
Twins Seven-Seven was also a dancer and musician who performed with bands. His works draw on Yoruba mythology, folktales and the spirit world, with dense patterns and many figures. He worked in painting, printmaking and carved panels, often using ink and paint on board. His work was exhibited abroad, including in Europe and the United States, and collected by museums.
He spent periods living in the United States, where he exhibited and taught. In 2005 he was named a UNESCO Artist for Peace. Twins Seven-Seven died in 2011. He is remembered as one of the most original artists of the Osogbo school.
A life story and Osogbo's artists
He often told colourful stories about his own life and adventures, and those stories fed into his art. Visitors to his studio found him as lively and talkative as his pictures were crowded. The town also produced artists such as Jimoh Buraimoh, Muraina Oyelami and Nike Davies-Okundaye, making Osogbo one of the best-known art centres in Africa.
Twins Seven-Seven took his name from a story about loss. His paintings filled every inch of their surface, as if he were making room for everyone who had not survived.
