Christie’s is consolidating on its mission to promote contemporary African art and African artists on a global level this year with a new show opening at the auction house’s Dubai showroom.

In a relatively new kind of collaboration that shows how auction houses, emboldened by success during the pandemic, are moving into new fields, Christie’s is partnering with Ghana’s Gallery 1957 to stage the month-long show titled (West) African Renaissance.

Beginning last Sunday, the show features established and emerging painters from West Africa and the African diaspora with a focus on the continent’s vibrant and soaring modern and contemporary art scene.

On display are works by Ghanaian artists Gideon Appah, Kwesi Botchway, Joshua Oheneba Takyi, Lord Ohene Okyere Bour, Annan Affotey, Serge Attukwei Clottey, Isshaq Ismail Godfried Donkor, Arthur Timothy, and Afia Prempeh, as well as works by Nigerian painters Oliver Okolo, Juwon Aderemi, and Peter Ojingiri.

The exhibition reveals the emphasis artists placed on portraiture and figurative abstraction — a growing trend over the past few years in works by many artists from the African continent, particularly from West Africa, as they focus on the people and symbols that make up their daily domestic, personal and public lives.

“Our focus has always been to support the careers of West African artists, and to ensure they continue to reach new audiences on the global stage,” said Marwan Zakhem, founder of Gallery 1957. “Working with Christie’s, a vocal promoter of African Contemporary art internationally is an obvious fit.”

“We continue to provide opportunities for our artists to engage with different communities and be visible to a wider international audience,” Zakhem told Arab News. “While this is our fourth time showing our artists in Dubai, we feel there is now a growing appetite for works by African artists in the region.”

“In partnering with Christie’s Dubai, the ever-flourishing creativity of the continent will continue to be seen by international audiences in a part of the world where collectors have long championed our work,” Zakhem added,

Recently Christie’s has been active in showing African art to the world and filling in to host spaces for African artists and exhibitions. Last year, when 1-54 Contemporary African Art Fair was unable to run as usual because of the Covid-19 pandemic, the auction house hosted curated exhibitions drawn from the fair’s galleries in their New York and Paris spaces.

“Promoting this exhibition on the international stage is a key priority for us,” Michael Jeha, chairman of Christie’s Middle East said. “Following our collaboration with 1-54 Contemporary African Art Fair, partnering with Gallery 1957 to present this exciting exhibition featuring so many of the leading names from West Africa is a perfect extension of our recent initiatives.”

“Dubai is a hub to so many different nationalities and collectors from around the world, so bringing contemporary African art to the city seemed only natural as we look to continue to internationalize art from this region and to expose it to an even wider audience,” he said.

Christie's declined to elaborate on how the profit from the new Dubai exhibition would be split.

[West] African Renaissance is on view at Christie’s Dubai until December 14. More information is available here.