ABOKI

“I created this work by spot welding metal rods to play around a stylized figure while I added metal plates to the form, used sawdust as texture, and gloss paint for the rusty brown metallic feel. Finally i brushed it lightly using a little red and yellow gloss paint for highlights.

Aboki means my friend and it is an Hausa word from the Northern part of Nigeria. In the southern part of Nigeria where i come from, it is a term used for any hardworking person who comes from the Northern part of the country.

We always need them for our daily needs and they are a part of our life, of note is the fact that they setup suya spots at night in places where there is high pedestrian traffic. The suya is brownish in color – reason for the finished work being textured and painted deep brown to look like suya. This work has metal lines shaped in the form of cowries (ancient currency used as a medium of exchange in Africa) to connote the importance of money and the reason for this kind of job been taking up by them. The truck itself has burnt inscriptions of different things I am always in contact with everyday.

Whenever the northerners leave the north for the south, they come to actualize their dreams of making money, while they go back home to invest.”