Oluwarotimi Adebiyi Wahab Fani-Kayode (April 1955 - December 21, 1989) was a Nigerian photographer working principally in Britain. He explored the tensions created by sexuality, race and culture through stylised portraits and compositions. The main body of his work was between 1982-1989.

Biography

Rotimi was born in Lagos, Nigeria in April 1955,the second child of Chief Babaremilekun Adetokunboh Fani-Kayode

Remi Fani-Kayode

Victor Babaremilekun Adetokunboh Fani-Kayode , Q.C., S.A.N, C.O.N was a leading Nigerian politician, aristocrat, nationalist, statesman and lawyer. He was elected Deputy Premier of the Western Region of Nigeria in 1963 and he played a major role in Nigeria's legal history and politics from the...

 and Chief Mrs Adia Adunni Fani-Kayode, their third child was Chief Femi Fani-Kayode

Femi Fani-Kayode

David Oluwafemi Adewunmi Abdulateef Fani-Kayode is a Nigerian politician, essayist, poet and lawyer. He is a member of the ruling Peoples Democratic Party . He was born in Lagos, Nigeria, on 16 October 1960 to Chief Victor Babaremilekun Adetokunboh Fani-Kayode and to Chief Adia Adunni...

, a Nigerian politician and who was the former Minister of Aviation for Nigeria. This prominent Yoruba family moved to Brighton, England, in 1966, after a military coup and the ensuing civil war. Rotimi pursued his secondary education in England where he went to a number of private schools including Brighton college

Brighton College

Brighton College is an institution divided between a Senior School known simply as Brighton College, the Prep School and the Pre-Prep School. All of these schools are co-educational independent schools in Brighton, England, sited immediately next to each another. The Senior School caters for...

, Seabright College and Millfield

Millfield

Millfield is an independent school in Street in Somerset, in south-west England.The school currently has a roll of 1,260 pupils, of whom 910 are boarders...

 then moved to the USA in 1976 to complete his education. He read Fine Arts and Economics, gaining a BA, at Georgetown University

Georgetown University

Georgetown University is a private, Jesuit, research university whose main campus is in the Georgetown neighborhood of Washington, D.C. Founded in 1789, it is the oldest Catholic university in the United States...

, Washington DC and gained an MFA at the Pratt Institute

Pratt Institute

Pratt Institute is a private art college in New York City located in Brooklyn, New York, with satellite campuses in Manhattan and Utica. Pratt is one of the leading undergraduate art schools in the United States and offers programs in Architecture, Graphic Design, History of Art and Design,...

, New York in Fine Arts & Photography. Whilst in New York he became friendly with Robert Mapplethorpe

Robert Mapplethorpe

Robert Mapplethorpe was an American photographer, known for his large-scale, highly stylized black and white portraits, photos of flowers and nude men...

 and later admitted to Mapplethorpe's influence on his work. He returned to the UK in 1983. He died in a London hospital of a heart attack whilst recovering from an AIDS related illness on the December 12, 1989. At the time of his death, he was living in Brixton, London with his partner and collaborator Alex Hirst.

Professional life

Although admitting to some influence by Mapplethorpe's earlier work, Rotimi Fani-Kayode pushed the bounds of his own art much further, exploring sexuality, racism, colonialism and the tensions and conflicts between his homosexuality and his Yoruba upbringing through a series of images in both colour and B/W. His work is imbued with the subtelty, irony and political and social comment that one would expect from an intelligent and observant black photographer of the late twentieth century. He also contributed much to the artistic debate around HIV and AIDS. He started to exhibit in 1984 and was involved with nine exhibitions between then and his death at the end of 1989. He has since had his work featured posthumously in many exhibitions and retrospectives. His work has been exhibited in the United Kingdom, France, Austria, Italy, Nigeria, Sweden, Germany, South Africa and US. In 1987 along with Mark Sealy he co-founded AUTOGRAPH ABP

Association of Black Photographers

The Association of Black Photographers is a British based, international, non-profit-making, photographic arts agency...

and became their first Chair. He was also an active member of The Black Audio Film Collective. He was a major influence on young black photographers in the late 1980s and 1990s. Following Alex Hirst's death in 1992 there was some controversy over attribution of his work, a discussion that still continues.

Publications

1986 Communion, London: Autograph

1987 Black Male/White Male photographs Rotimi Fani-Kayode, Text by Alex Hirst London:Gay Mens Press

1988 Traces of Ecstasy,” Ten-8, no. 28

1997 Rotimi Fani-Kayode & Alex Hirst Photographs London:Autograph ABP

Quotes

“My identity has been constructed from my own sense of otherness, whether cultural, racial or sexual. The three aspects are not separate within me. Photography is the tool by which I feel most confident in expressing myself. It is photography therefore — Black, African, homosexual photography — which I must use not just as an instrument, but as a weapon if I am to resist attacks on my integrity and, indeed, my existence on my own terms.”

External links

• Jean Marc Patras/Galerie Full catalogue of exhibitions and Major article.
• GLBTQ Arts - Rotimi Fani-Kayode Major article, bibliography and links to other sources.
• AUTOGRAPH Association of Black Photographers