George "Fowokan" Kelly
| Fowokan | |
|---|---|
 |
|
| Born |
Kenness George Kelly 1 April 1943 Kingston, Jamaica |
| Nationality | British |
| Education | Self-taught |
| Known for | Sculpture |
| Notable work | Say it Loud (2001), Property of a Gentleman 1807 (c. 1996), |
| Patron(s) | |
George "Fowokan" Kelly (born 1 April 1943) is a Jamaican-born visual artist who lives in Britain and exhibits using the name "Fowokan" (a Yoruba word meaning: "one who creates with the hand"). He is a largely self-taught artist, who has been practising sculpture since 1980. His work is full of the ambivalence he sees in the deep-rooted spiritual and mental conflict between the African and the European. Fowokan's work is rooted in the traditions of pre-colonial Africa and ancient Egypt rather than the Greco-Roman art of the west. He has also been a jeweller, essayist, poet and musician (a former member of the funk group Cymande in the early 1970s).
Born as Kenness George Kelly in Kingston, Jamaica, he migrated to Britain in 1957 and lived in Brixton, South London.
He decided to become an artist while on a visit to Benin, Nigeria, in the mid-1970s. He had travelled as a musician to Nigeria, where he experienced some kind of spiritual transformation or enlightenment. He returned to London determined to acquire knowledge of the technique of sculpture, which he was able to find in books and through trial and error. Coming to the visual arts comparatively late in life, he deliberately chose not to be trained in western institutions, which he felt could not teach him what he wanted to know, they being too deeply entrenched in their own traditions with little or no understanding or interest in the things that interested him most – the ideas behind the art and culture of Africa.
The philosophical aspect of his oeuvre came with his travels through various parts of Africa, exploring the spiritual side of his ancestral home. He believes the intuitive/spiritual aspect of reality that still abounds in Africa was his art school and university. He has also written essays that have been published in books and magazines.
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