Awelewa

Name: Awelewa
Brand: Raknida
Price: 55.0 USD
Availability: InStock

Funmilayo Todimu Tejumola

Painted portrait of a woman with a colour-block face in blue, pink and teal, wearing a cream veil patterned in navy, orange folds and a gold-beaded fringe, on a black background.

$55.00

Awẹlẹwà, the slender, beautiful one: Funmilayo Tejumola's portrait of African womanhood, carrying the hope of an African renaissance under a gold-beaded veil.

Awelewa is a Studio Edition: 20 museum-quality art prints in each size, each numbered in its white border. Every artwork comes with its Cultural Passport.

The Cultural Passport

Every order comes with the heritage documented.

Digital, emailed when your order ships: the work's story, the tradition it draws on and how it was made. 5 × 7 in (13 × 18 cm), ready to print and frame beside the work.

How it works →

Awẹlẹwà means the slender, beautiful one. For Funmilayo Tejumola she embodies the poise and beauty of African womanhood, and her gaze is resolute, turned toward a hopeful future. The artist goes further: Awẹlẹwà carries the hope of an African renaissance. She is both a champion of that renewal and one who helps bring it into being.

Out of a black ground comes a cream veil folded with orange, a fringe of gold beads across the brow. With them comes a face assembled from blue, rose and teal. Find the small navy marks running down the veil like lines of handwriting. Funmilayo chose bold colour over dark tones to celebrate Blackness, and here every colour serves one steady face.

Motifs in this work

The name Awẹlẹwà: the slender, beautiful one

The forward gaze: hope for an African renaissance

Gold-bead fringe: adornment framing a resolute face

Edition: Edition of 20 in each size · 20 across all sizes. Further runs possible once a size sells out, each tagged (Run 2). Edition numbers count the works sold through Raknida; the artist may also sell their own editions of this work.
Numbering: Number, title and artist printed in the white border.
Printing: Museum-quality giclée with archival pigment inks on museum-grade cotton fine art paper.
Includes: Your numbered artwork and its Cultural Passport.

Size	Sheet	Image	Museum-Quality Print only	Framed	Available
S	8 × 12 in	6½ × 9¾ in	$55	+$65	20

The artist

Funmilayo Todimu Tejumola

Undeclared · Ibadan, Nigeria · 2 works on Raknida

Funmilayo Tejumola, who signs her works as Démo Àjòké, is a Nigerian visual artist based in Ibadan. Her figurative painting explores African history, cultural memory, identity and the ways traditions shape the present and future. She holds a B.A. in Fine Art from Ahmadu Bello University, Zaria, and an M.A. in African and Diaspora Studies from the University of Lagos. Where Blackness is often painted in dark tones, she paints it in bold colour. She does so to "celebrate our heritage, express cultural pride, and tell stories that reflect the richness of who we are."

View full profile →All 2 works →