Helene Love-Allotey
Head of Department
Lot 4
Ernesto Shikhani(Mozambican , 1934-2010)Libertação dos Povos Negros
2 May 2019, 14:00 EDT
New YorkUS$6,000 - US$9,000
Looking for a similar item?
Our African Modern & Contemporary Art specialists can help you find a similar item at an auction or via a private sale.
Find your local specialistAsk about this lot
Ernesto Shikhani (Mozambican , 1934-2010)
Libertação dos Povos Negros
signed and dated 'SHIKHANI/ 74' (upper right); inscribed '-1- Libertação dos Povos Negros' (verso)
oil on canvas
100 x 50.5cm (39 3/8 x 19 7/8in).
signed and dated 'SHIKHANI/ 74' (upper right); inscribed '-1- Libertação dos Povos Negros' (verso)
oil on canvas
100 x 50.5cm (39 3/8 x 19 7/8in).
Footnotes
Provenance
Acquired by Mr Guglielmo Riccitelli in East Africa in the late 1970s.
By direct descent to the current owner.
Shikhani and his contemporaries, the artists Malangatana and Chissano, were part of a prominent group of artists in Mozambique who played a key role in broadening aesthetic reciprocity across Africa, Europe and the USA.
Following his first solo show in Maputo in 1968, Shikhani was awarded a scholarship from the Gulbenkian Foundation in Lisbon in 1973. The grant enabled the artist to exhibit internationally.
However, when his works went on display in Lisbon, their overtly political nature and nationalist sentiment soon attracted the attention of the PIDE (Portuguese International and State Defense Police). The exhibition was shut down and Shikani's works confiscated.
At the time this painting was executed, a ceasefire had just been negotiated been FRELIMO and Portugal, bringing a decade of violence to an end. This was a pivotal moment for the artist, finally freed from the constraints of colonial censorship.
