#rotimi fani-kayode

[frmarino]

photographer: Rotimi Fani-Kayode

[makingqueerhistory]

Sacrament of Bodies         

Romeo Oriogun       

In this groundbreaking collection of poems, Sacrament of Bodies, Romeo Oriogun fearlessly interrogates how a queer man in Nigeria can heal in a society where everything is designed to prevent such restoration. With honesty, precision, tenderness of detail, and a light touch, Oriogun explores grief and how the body finds survival through migration.

[guy60660]

Rotimi Fani-Kayode | Aesthetica

[adreciclarte5]

by Rotimi Fani-Kayode

[creativespark]

Rotimi Fani-Kayode (Nigerian, 1955–1989), City Gent, 1988

[joeinct]

Halt-Opened Eyes, Twins, Photo by Rotimi Fani-Kayode, 1989

[nununiverse]

ROTIMI FANI-KAYODE photography

[abstraxia]

Rotimi Fani-Kayode's 'Sonponnoi' 1987

"Within the Yoruba religion, the smallpox god was at one time powerful, feared and deadly if crossed. Sonponnoi was shunned by his fellow divinities or Orisha. The god was forced to roam the bush and his shrines were excluded from towns. As public anxiety around HIV transmission peaked, right wing groups and tabloid headlines whipped up majority prejudice against both gay men and Africans. Rotimi Fani-Cayode fell into both groups. He was also HIV-positive. The artist found a resonant symbol in the image of an outcast God, one that embodies infection, carrying the threat of death, yet also offers protection. During these painful years, other gay artists turned to St. Sebastian, already an established homoerotic pin-up. Sebastian’s old role as plague saint–both protector and sympathetic victim–came back to the fore in queer AIDS-themed art. It was Sebastian's arrow wounds that suggested to medieval Christians the plague sufferer’s pustules. Sonponnoi was also a spotted god. Cult carvings and ritual devotees alike were often covered with dots of paint to evoke the box's symptoms. During the crisis of the 1980s, the defining sign of AIDS-related illness in the public mind again became a pattern of skin markings, the purplish lesions of Kaposi's sarcoma. All these stigmata seemed to emerge in Sonponnoi, yet as the erect candle held by this unwelcome god reminds us, even the disease-bearing queer body feels the flame of desire."

From Pilcher, A. (2017). A Queer Little History of Art. London: Tate Publishing.

[bspoquemagazine]

Das C/O wird 25! die Jahresvorschau für 2025

Mit über 250 Ausstellungen von mehr als 500 Künstler:innen, der Förderung von 250 Talenten sowie der Etablierung eines neuen Preisformats trägt C/O Berlin kontinuierlich neue Impulse in die Welt der Fotografie.

[photoarchive]

Rotimi Fani-Kayode, Under the Surplice, 1987

[cosmicanger]

Rotimi Fani Kayode

[frmarino]

photographer: Rotimi Fani-Kayode

[makingqueerhistory]

Rotimi Fani-Kayode was a photographer, whose work was revolutionary for his time and remains so today. A gay man who came from Nigeria and moved from England to America, he had a diverse range of experiences around himself and his queerness, and he used his photography to translate those experiences into art.

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[nahalism]

Rotimi Fani-Kayode, Four Twins

[adreciclarte5]

by Rotimi Fani-Kayode

[art-and-agony]

Abiku (Born to Die)

Rotimi Fani-Kayode, 1988