Africa’s largest art fair, FNB Art Joburg, which takes place in Johannesburg this weekend, is attracting increasing numbers of African buyers, exhibitors said on Saturday.
The fair, which began in 2008, is showcasing 500 works by 100 artists from across the continent this weekend. Last year, most of the works sold for up to R20 million (€1 million).
“There are definitely more Africans starting to collect African art and this is the most exciting development we have seen since we opened our gallery in 2009,” says Valerie Kabov, director of First Floor Gallery Harare, Zimbabwe.
“For us, the support of local collectors is really meaningful because they feel represented by the art and the works they like and choose are also markedly different from those preferred by non-Zimbabwean collectors,” she says.
The global art market suffered a setback last year but Africa weathered the turbulence better than most countries, according to a report by London-based analyst firm ArtTactic.
Sales of modern and contemporary African art fell 8.4% in 2023 while the market as a whole fell 18%, the report said.
This study does not disclose the amount of sales but highlights the strong presence of African buyers: at the famous auction house Sotheby’s, for example, African buyers represented two-thirds of African art sales last year.
“There is a kind of renaissance on the African continent,” says Kampamba Mabuluki of the Modiz Arts Gallery in Zambia. “This fair is an illustration of that. It is a very good example of what is happening in the region,” he says.
For Zimbabwean painter Gresham Tapiwa Nyaude, represented by First Floor Gallery Harare, “earlier our paintings were considered primitive because it was as if they were only found in caves,” he says.
“Our African painting is very esoteric and very intelligent, because we talk about social issues, we talk about what happens to us and in an authentic way,” he believes, judging that it is not about “decorations” but “something real, something that affects us on a daily basis.”
His work entitled “MCMLXXX”, which won first prize at the Johannesburg fair, deals with drug use and concerns about artificial intelligence.
The name of the work in Roman numerals refers to 1980, the year of Zimbabwe’s independence.
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