By Osa Mbonu-Amadi, Arts Editor
A joint art exhibition of paintings in which two popular artists, Ebenezer Akinola and Raji Babatunde, are conducting inquiries into the mystery of Spirituality and Light opens Saturday, Novermber 8, and runs till November 22, 2025 at Alexis Galleries, off Idowu Martins, Victoria Island, Lagos.
Alexis Galleries describes Ebenezer as an “internationally renowned artist”, and Raji Mohammed Babatunde as his mentee. “The exhibition is engaged in an inquiry into our transcendence,” says the gallery.
For Curator of Spirituality and Light, Uche Obasi, the exhibition “engages psycho-visual gestures in painting that invite the viewer to encounter and lay hold of the quiet luminescence of divine radiance, the instincts and intuitions that lead, drive, and shape our everyday lives in both good and bad times.”
“Ebenezer Akinola’s paintings, imbued with subtle light and shadow, are characterized by performative and inventive imagery of real people — often strangers or neighbors who staged for him as formidable subjects.
“These figures,” the Curator writes, “appear engaged in esoteric rituals, draped in heavily layered cloth, adorned with jewel-toned ornaments and head scarves, uniformly positioned in theatrical gestures and encircling a fanning cyclone of burning furnaces.”
According to Obasi, “Babatunde treats luminous light as revelation; he stages figures, often women in restless, searching poses — who hold lamps, mirrors, and hourglasses as alchemical anchors of divine illumination and knowledge. In his self-staged portrait titled Reflection of Our Inner Light, Babatunde assumes the role of both subject and seeker, holding his alter ego —a fragile glow of faith — reflected as a mirror depicting a child intent on holding a candlelight.
Spirituality and Light examines how light — both primal and literal, or spiritual — shapes identity and self-consciousness across our contemporary moment.
Ebenezer Samuel Akinola, born 1968, in Ibadan, Nigeria, is a prominent figurative painter whose works explore cultural transcendent, spirituality, and identity. He is a 1989 first-class graduate of Fine Art and Painting from the University of Benin. His commissioned portraits of former Nigerian presidents Azikiwe, Abubakar, and Obasanjo reside in the National Gallery of Art, Nigeria.
“The body of works I create represents my imagined gatekeepers: figures that stand as custodians of access, wisdom, transformation and life. Through my art, I explore what communal fraternity might look like in a world where the spiritual and the material coexist,” Ebenezer says. “In this exploration, I seek to visualise the interplay between individuality and community, the sacred and the everyday. By reimagining gatekeepers and the ceremonies that honour them, I invite the viewer to question their own relationship with the unseen and consider the rituals, both personal and collective, that guide them through life’s many thresholds.”
Raji Mohammed Babatunde, born 1986, in Lagos, Nigeria, is an impressionist painter popular for his warm, figurative portraits that capture everyday life of women and the innocence of childhood.
He was a 2008 NCE graduate of Adeniran Ogunsanya College of Education before proceeding to the University of Nigeria, Nsukka for B.A. in Art Education in 2015. He trained under notable artists, including Ebenezer Akinola. He currently serves as Coordinator of Space29.7 Studios in Lagos.
“Light is very symbolic in spirituality and art as means of expression. Merging both of these results in not just a composition but a feeling of sacredness of the divine using the visual language of light. It’s about making the invisible visually visible,” Babatunde says. “In this sub-series, I seek to visualise the sacred connections between humans and the divine; how we reverence and honour the presence and awesomeness of our creator in our private spaces or as a group; the magnificent way his light radiates in our lives and how it reflects on elements that concerns us including our immediate environment.”
Speaking with Vanguard Newspaper in an interview for the exhibition, Ebenezer talked about what he called the inner light; how he said to Babatunde: “Let’s do something that is very profound, something that people can relate with.” He said he suggested to Babatunde to talk about Light, while he himself talks about Spirituality.
However, Babatunde says “The light we are talking about is way more than artificial form of light.”
How long did it take the artists to prepare for this exhibition?
Babatunde said in terms of the time it took to create works of art, people usually talk about the time of preparation, and the time spent to do the work on canvas. “But we need to talk about the time of the ideation, the conception level, because we started since last year, I think the fourth quarter last year.”
Among the titles of works Ebenezer brings to Spirituality and Light are “The Overseer 1&2”, “Communion”, “Silence of Expectation”, and ” The Gatekeepers of Paradise.”
Raji Babatunde’s works for the exhibition are titled “Imole”, “Reflection of Our Inner Light”, “Greater Light 1&2”, and “Encounter”.
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