Demas Nwoko

Demas Nwoko is an artist, designer, architect and stage designer. Nwoko was a student at the Zaria Art School, Nigeria, and a major protagonist of the Zaria Art Society. Its manifesto of a Natural Synthesis of precolonial Nigerian arts and an eclectic relation to modernism can still be witnessed in Nwoko’s architectural work. Together with Uche Okeke and Ulli Beier he was a member of the Mbari Club of Ibadan. In the 1970s he co-published New Culture, a progressive African arts magazine. Demas Nwoko understands modernity as a critical process of enquiry. In his architectural approach he acknowledges African building practices allowing the possibility to add to buildings over time with a focus on social responsibility for the environment and local cultures.