Museums in Nigeria are owned by the government and like other public facilities, museums suffer from under-funding and poor maintenance. This has made facilities with art materials which have strong links to peoples identities and cultures have little appeal. But a Nigerian University and a Yoruba prince have partnered to change this.
In October 2019, the partnership between the Pan-Atlantic University and Prince Yemisi Shyllon — a Yoruba prince from Ogun state in southwest Nigeria — who is one of the country’s biggest art collectors, birthed the establishment of the Yemisi Shyllon Museum of Art.
The 1200 square-meter museum located at the Ibeju Lekki campus of the university was built with a $1.7m grant by Prince Shyllon through his foundation; the Omooba Yemisi Adedoyin Shyllon Art Foundation. To keep the facility in an exquisite shape, the museum will be maintained for 15 years by the foundation.
The 68-year-old prince who had been collecting art pieces since his undergraduate days at the University of Ibadan and still source for art works when he travels, donated 1,000 pieces of his private collections to the museum.
The artwork on display at the museum number about 1,200 and range from traditional works of pre-colonial Nigeria to modern day paintings and photographs. Arts from different nations of Africa grace the museum’s gallery. Original works of Nigerian artists such as Ben Enwonwu, Nike Davies-Okundaye, Victor Ehikhamenor and Jerry Buhari are featured.
“I want to leave with a legacy. I want to have contributed towards Nigerians and Africans knowing what they are. I hope this museum can serve as a catalyst for art in Nigeria and in the continent,” Prince Shyllon was quoted by Quartz Africa as saying.
For him, the museum is not just about providing the eyes with something beautiful to feed on, it is about educating the people.
“There is vibrant art in Lagos and Nigeria, but the important question is about what people can learn from the art. We don’t quite know what and where we are, but art can show us these things. We need a reeducation and museums are the place for a certain type of education, but they are very few here,” he said.
The board of Pan-Atlantic University dreamed of establishing a museum. In 2011, the school set up a virtual museum of modern and contemporary Nigerian art. The partnership with the Omooba Yemisi Adedoyin Shyllon Art Foundation brought the dream to reality. The museum is an independent non-commercial institution and educational resource for an educational purpose, which makes it the first of its kind in Nigeria.
Jesse Castellote, Spanish architect who designed the museum and heads it said “we are looking to teach our visitors Nigerian history through art.”
“We are providing a vehicle to spark curiosity, questions, inspiration, discovery and it is up to visitors to decide what they want to learn and discover,” he explained.
He also said the museum has more artworks than it could display because of space limitation. So “it is important to us that the artworks we collect are able to serve an educational purpose.”
Prince Shyllon is hoping that the museum would be seen as a potential place to hold African works returned from Europe.
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