Nigeria Content Online

On Thursday, May
27, a little soiree took place at Jazzhole, a quaint bookshop/record
shop cum cafe on Awolowo Road, Ikoyi, Lagos, which gave testament to
the love of the arts. Friends and colleagues gathered to honour and
share experiences with the man, Toyin Alfred Akinoso, better known as
‘Poblisha’, as part of activities commemorating his 50th birthday.

Some would describe
Toyin Akinosho as a geologist and a cultural landscapist. But many
would better know him as the writer of Artsville, the art and
literature review column in Sunday Guardian; as publisher of Africa Oil
and Gas report, and as Secretary General of the Committee for Relevant
Art (CORA).

The event was a reading and interview session anchored by Kole-Ade Odutola and Molara Wood, Arts and Culture Editor of NEXT.

In attendance at
the event were notable arts personalities as Kenyan Caine winner,
Binyavanga Wainaina, writer Toni Kan, Sunday Umweni, Jahman Anikulapo,
Sunday Bayo Akinpelu, Francis Onwochei, and Yinka Davies. These and
many others, joined Akinosho to read excerpts of his past column
pieces, as well as stories and poems such as ‘Lagos Housegirl,’ ‘Berlin
Wall’ and ‘Night’, among other excerpts.

Akinosho reminisces

The evening of
banter was not complete without a host of anecdotes and insights from
The Publisher, who at the prompting of the hosts, regaled his guests
with recollections of his experiences in the city which he terms ‘My
Lagos… my life’. Akinosho took his audience back to the mid-80s, when
as a young adult, he explored all that Lagos had to offer him by way of
its art and entertainment culture. Despite obtaining his undergraduate
degree from the University of Ife, the Geology graduate admitted that
in comparison with Lagos, Ife seemed less artistically developed,
making him resort to making trips to Lagos every two weeks.

Akinosho told of
growing up on Vaughn Street, Apapa; of not having formal nursery
education, and of being more street smart than his Montgomery Road
contemporaries, who were considered more refined. As he recalled
proudly, “They could speak the English, but we could write it”. He
remembered visiting cinemas like Roxy, Apapa, and Metro on Ikorodu
Road, of dining in Bristol Hotel for N4.40 kobo; exploring Nefertiti,
an Egyptian restaurant (on Ikorodu Road); frequenting Fela Anikulapo
Kuti’s Sunday Jump at the Empire Hotel; of fishing at Ijora before the
National Theatre was constructed, and how, from the Cool Cat Inn, he
made out strains of Eric ‘Showboy’ Akaeze’s trumpets as he played his
Highlife far into the night.

“The Lagos of my
childhood was close-knit”, he remarked. “As a child, I could stay out
till the early hours of the morning playing with friends, so long as I
was within the neighbourhood; and it was not a rare occurrence to have
people staying out till very late. Even when I ventured into
journalism, many of my initial sources were family and friends.”

Initiation into the arts

Akinosho’s interest
in the arts began when he was a student of Geology in the University of
Ife. “The Geology department overlooked the Peak Theatre, the arts hub
of the institution, so I would watch from across until one day when I
attended a lecture and fell in love with the arts”.

In the course of
time, he approached Sunday Umweni, and spoke with him about his
interest after which he wrote a review, which was published in Lagos
Weekend, an effort which set off his career as a writer and reviewer.
While he was still in university, The Guardian newspaper was
established, and he joined as a freelancer. He considered this move the
next step towards a career in the arts because of the publication’s
crop of popular writers. Also along the line, he met with J.P Clark,
founder of the Pet Repertory Theatre, who said to Akinosho words he
still holds dear – “I am interested in your interest” – and took him
under his wing.

According to
Akinosho, his study of Geology had prepared him for a career in the
arts, as he finds a congruity between both disciplines. “There’s a
particular relationship between Geology and storytelling”, he said,
“Geologists are story tellers, starting from the end and working their
way towards the big picture. This allows for complete thought and has
helped me immensely in journalism and arts.”

Arts’ future

The economy has a
lot to do with the art industry and according to the arts connoisseur,
arts and entertainment can only be invested in after the basic needs of
an individual have been met. Unfortunately, however, for the middle
class Nigerian, the left-over expendable funds after these needs have
been satisfied is minuscule, so the arts have had to rely heavily on
sponsorship and international funding. Decay, lack of planning, and the
economic downturn of the late 80’s and 90s had resulted in the demise
of the art industry, which is only now beginning to recover structures
that had been in place in the 70s.

Akinosho’s
recurrent message at the event was that ‘we have been here before’.
There was a time, he said nostalgically, when cinemas, stage
performances, music, and art were well established and no one could
have foreseen their disappearance, but peter out they did. Now that
again the arts are gaining ground with the establishment of new
cinemas, the emergence of African voices in literature, music and art,
culture and arts practitioners need to expend no small effort in
sustaining the industry and its talents, and in ensuring that the arts
industry does not again fade out of sight.

Akinosho and Molara
Wood took a moment during the event to recognise the contribution of T
.M Aluko – whose burial took place Friday, May 28 – as a writer and
raconteur of Lagos life and the psychology of the middle class and
civil servants in the 1960s. They enjoined that the current crop of
literary critics place the late writer in the ‘pantheon of writers’
where he rightly belongs.

Amid reminisces, Akinosho stressed the need for more art and
literary critics, and recommended the practice of honest and objective
critiquing.