Curating OYASAF's New Gallery Wing Dedicated to Drawings

Behind every thoughtfully arranged gallery space lies months, sometimes years, of meticulous curatorial labour. The Omooba Yemisi Adedoyin Shyllon Art Foundation has recently opened a new wing devoted entirely to drawings, offering visitors an intimate look at the foundational gestures behind Nigerian and African artistic practice. Works on paper carry a particular vulnerability and a particular honesty. They capture the first spark of an idea, the search for a line, the corrections and revisions that precede a finished painting or sculpture. By dedicating an entire gallery to this often-overlooked medium, the foundation signals a serious commitment to scholarship, conservation, and public education.

The curatorial team approached the project as both an archival exercise and an act of advocacy. Drawings are fragile, frequently reproduced, and rarely given the wall space they deserve in institutions focused on monumental works. The new wing reverses that pattern, placing sheets by modern masters alongside sketches by contemporary practitioners. Visitors who might never see the inside of a private archive now encounter preparatory studies, portrait drawings, and experimental compositions in carefully controlled light.

The vision for a drawings-focused space

From the earliest planning meetings, the curatorial team framed the wing as an opportunity to tell stories that larger works cannot. A finished oil painting often arrives at a museum fully resolved, its narrative sealed. A drawing, by contrast, reveals the artist's hand at work: the hesitation before a curve, the layering of charcoal, the pentimento where a figure was repositioned. The wing's thematic organisation follows that logic, grouping works by process rather than by chronology or geography.

The foundation's leadership also wanted the space to serve scholars. University researchers from Lagos, Accra, and beyond regularly request access to preparatory studies, but paper-based collections demand strict environmental controls and limited handling. A purpose-built wing allows OYASAF to accommodate these requests while protecting each sheet for future generations. The decision reflects a broader shift in how African art institutions think about their holdings, treating drawings as primary sources rather than secondary materials.

Acquiring works for the collection

Building a collection of this scope requires patience, relationships, and a clear editorial eye. The curatorial team spent two years travelling across West Africa and Europe, meeting with artists, estates, and private collectors. Many of the most compelling drawings surfaced through long conversations with families who had safeguarded sketchbooks for decades, uncertain whether the works held any value beyond the personal. The foundation's reputation for careful stewardship often made the difference.

This kind of acquisition work parallels trends in the Australian art market, where collectors at fairs such as Sydney Contemporary and Melbourne Art Fair have shown a growing appetite for historical African drawings. Dealers in Sydney's Walsh Bay arts precinct and Melbourne's Collingwood warehouse district now regularly handle works on paper by West African artists, and several major private collections held by Australian institutions include significant holdings of twentieth-century Nigerian sketches. The foundation has benefited from these transcontinental networks, occasionally receiving works on long-term loan from Australian-based collectors who wish to see their drawings returned to the African continent for study.

Conservation challenges with works on paper

Drawings demand a different conservation philosophy than paintings or sculptures. Paper reacts to humidity, light, and airborne pollutants in ways that canvas rarely does. Foxing, acid migration, and ink fade can compromise a work within decades if it is poorly stored. The foundation's conservators spent months stabilising the new acquisitions before installation, treating each sheet individually and designing custom mounts that allow safe handling during research and photography.

Climate control presented serious technical difficulties. Lagos's humidity fluctuates dramatically between the harmattan season and the rains, and the foundation's new wing incorporates passive climate management alongside active systems. Visitors familiar with the strict environmental standards at the National Gallery of Victoria or the Art Gallery of New South Wales will recognise similar logic at work: stable temperature, filtered light, and rigorous monitoring. Young conservators interested in this specialised field can find practical guidance in art restoration career advice from OYASAF conservators, which outlines the training pathways the foundation recommends.

Designing the visitor experience

The wing's physical design emerged from a series of workshops with architects, lighting designers, and accessibility consultants. Drawings cannot tolerate the bright illumination often used in painting galleries, so the team developed a layered lighting scheme that allows works to be viewed clearly while limiting cumulative light exposure. Walls were finished in warm neutrals that complement the tonality of charcoal, graphite, and coloured pencil without competing with the marks themselves.

The flow of the space encourages close looking. Bench seating invites visitors to sit with individual drawings, and magnifying glasses are available at the entrance for those who wish to examine paper texture and pencil pressure. Quiet study areas nearby accommodate researchers and school groups. The design borrows conceptually from smaller paper-focused galleries in institutions such as the Whitworth in Manchester and the Morgan Library in New York, adapting those models for a Lagos context and for audiences who may be encountering drawings as a category for the first time.

Scholarly research and cataloguing

Every drawing entering the wing is catalogued to international standards, with full provenance research, condition reports, and technical imaging. The foundation has partnered with universities in Nigeria, the United Kingdom, and South Africa to produce a multi-volume catalogue raisonné that will accompany the exhibition. Essays commissioned for the project explore themes ranging from the role of drawing in Yoruba art schools to the influence of European academies on twentieth-century Nigerian training.

This scholarly ambition connects to the foundation's wider programming. Emerging artists and researchers regularly submit work to OYASAF's annual art competition, and several past entrants have contributed research essays to the wing's catalogue. The competition functions as both a talent pipeline and an intellectual community, ensuring that the foundation remains engaged with living practice rather than treating its collection as a closed historical archive.

Educational programmes and public engagement

The wing opened with a programme of public events designed to demystify the drawing process. School groups from across Lagos participated in workshops led by contemporary artists, who guided students through exercises in observational drawing using the gallery's works as reference points. Weekend family programmes introduced younger visitors to concepts like contour, gesture, and value, while evening talks brought in scholars and curators to discuss specific sheets in detail.

Digital engagement extends the wing's reach beyond its physical walls. High-resolution images of selected drawings are available through the foundation's online platform, accompanied by curatorial commentary and short videos produced in collaboration with Nigerian filmmakers. This hybrid approach reflects lessons learned during recent years of pandemic-related closures, when cultural institutions across the world, from the National Gallery of Australia to the National Museum of African Art in Washington, discovered how much audiences value thoughtful digital interpretation alongside in-person experience.

The wing within OYASAF's broader mission

The drawings wing represents a significant step in the foundation's long-term plan to position Nigerian art within global art historical discourse while remaining rooted in local community. By treating drawings as worthy of dedicated space, careful scholarship, and public celebration, the foundation challenges the hierarchies that have historically privileged painting and sculpture. The wing also creates infrastructure for future growth: storage, conservation labs, and study rooms that will serve acquisitions yet to come.

This is a moment of expansion rather than arrival. The foundation continues to acquire, conserve, and exhibit, and the new wing will rotate its displays regularly to reflect ongoing research and donations. Visitors, scholars, and supporters can follow these developments through the foundation's main website at nigerianartoyasaf.org, where news of upcoming exhibitions, conservation projects, and educational initiatives is posted throughout the year. The drawings wing is not a finished statement but an opening, an invitation to look more closely at the lines that shape African art history.