Local Import: Anthony Olubunmi Akinbola

The Museum of Arts and Design has selected Anthony Akinbola as its eighth MAD Artist Fellow. Created in 2016, the fellowship is dedicated to promoting emerging artists from historically underrepresented communities. MAD Fellows work on site fulltime in a dedicated studio space and receive a solo exhibition at the Museum at the end of their fellowship.

A first-generation American of Nigerian origin, Anthony Akinbola’s layered and multifaceted compositions celebrate and reconcile the cultures that compose his identity. At MAD, Akinbola will continue his exploration of the use of durags—fibre scarves used in the maintenance of black hair—as both a material for art-making and a commentary on larger issues of identity, respectability, and commodification of African American culture.

In 2018, Akinbola created a monumental wall collage for the Queens Museum and his work has been included in group exhibitions at Denny Dimin Gallery, New Image Art Gallery, Bronx River Art Center, Miranda Kuo Gallery, and The Verbeke Foundation in Belgium. Akinbola received a BA in communications and media from SUNY Purchase College.

Image courtesy of the Museum of Arts and Design. Photo: Heidi Bohnenkamp