Born: 1955 Lagos, Nigeria
Died: 1989 London, England
Year of Migration to the UK: 1966
Other name/s: Oluwarotimi Adebiyi Wahab Fani-Kayode
Biography
Photographer Rotimi Fani-Kayode was born Oluwarotimi Adebiyi Wahab Fani-Kayode, the second child of a prominent Yoruba family of southwest Nigeria (Chief Babaremilekun Adetokunboh Fani-Kayode and Chief Mrs Adia Adunni Fani-Kayode) in Lagos, Nigeria on 20 April 1955,. The Kayode family were the keepers of the Shrine of Yoruba Deities and priests of Ife, regarded as the spiritual heartland of the Yoruba people. His father moved his family from Nigeria to Brighton, England in 1966, fleeing the violent events which led to the Biafran Civil War (1967–70); Fani-Kayode was eleven at the time. He grew up in England and attended a number of private schools, including Brighton College, Seabright College and Millfield School. He moved to the USA in 1976 to attend Georgetown University in Washington, D. C., where he studied Fine Arts and Economics. He subsequently received an MFA in Fine Arts and Photography from the Pratt Institute in New York. While in New York, Fani-Kayode met Robert Mapplethorpe, who he has claimed as an influence on his work. Fani-Kayode returned to Britain in 1983 to pursue photography, where he met his partner and collaborator, the writer and artist Alex Hirst (1951–1992).
The main body of Fani-Kayode's work was created between 1983 and 1989. His photographs have been exhibited internationally since 1985, including several solo exhibitions presented by Autograph ABP at Riverside Studios, London in 1986; Harvard University, USA in 2009; Rivington Place, London in 2011; Iziko South African National Gallery, South Africa in 2014; Syracuse University Art Gallery, New York in 2016; and Hales Project Room, New York in 2018. In 2003, his work featured in the African Pavilion at the 50th Venice Biennale Italy, and in 2011 in ARS 11 at Kiasma-Museum of Contemporary Art, Helsinki, Finland. In 2020 his work featured in the major exhibition Masculinities: Liberation through Photography, at the Barbican Centre, London.
In 1988, Fani-Kayode with a number of other photographers, including Sunil Gupta, Monika Baker, Merle Van den Bosch, Pratibha Parmar, Ingrid Pollard, Roshini Kempadoo and Armet Francis, co-founded the Association of Black Photographers (now known as Autograph ABP) and became their first chair. He was also an active member of the Black Audio Film Collective. Fani-Kayode died in London, England on 21 December 1989, at the age of 34, from a heart attack following an AIDS-related illness.
Working at the height of the AIDS crisis and the homophobic cultures of both Britain and his native Nigeria, Fani-Kayode’s photographic portraits explore complex personal and politically engaged notions of queer black desire, spirituality, and cultural dislocation. Combining African and European iconography, his work depicted the male body as a focal point both to interpret and probe the boundaries of spiritual and erotic fantasy, and of cultural and sexual difference. For Fani-Kayode, the medium of photography enabled him not only to question issues of sexuality and homoerotic desire, but also to address themes of diaspora and belonging, and the tensions between his homosexuality and his Yoruba upbringing. As he himself famously spoke about his identity in relation to his work, 'On three counts I am an outsider: in matters of sexuality; in terms of geographical and cultural dislocation and in the sense of not having become the sort of respectably married professional my parents might have hoped for.' (R. Fani-Kayode 1996, p. 5). Fani-Kayode’s powerful legacy continues to speak to urgent issues concerning identity politics, belonging and desire, and has deeply impacted subsequent generations of contemporary artists and photographers. Fani-Kayode's works are represented in the UK public domain in the collections of Autograph ABP, Victoria and Albert Museum, Tate (all London) and Brighton Museum and Art Gallery, Brighton.
Related books
- Mark Sealy, Steven Evans, Max Fields and Christine Eyene, eds., African Cosmologies: Photography, Time, and the Other (Amsterdam: Schilt Publishing and Houston: FotoFest, Inc., 2020)
- Alona Pardo ed., Masculinities: Liberation Through Photography (Münich, London and New York: Prestel, 2020)
- Mark Sealy, Decolonising the Camera: Photography in Racial Time (London: Lawrence & Wishart, 2019)
- W. Ian Bourland, Bloodflowers: Rotimi Fani-Kayode, Photography, and the 1980s (Durham and London: Duke University Press, 2019)
- William J. Simmons, Rotimi Fani-Kayode: Rage and Desire (London: Hales Gallery, 2018)
- Kobena Mercer, Travel & See: Black Diaspora Art Practices Since the 1980s (Durham: Duke University Press, 2016)
- Rotimi Fani-Kayode (1955–1989), exhib. cat. (Syracuse: Light Work, 2015)
- Renée Mussai, Bisi Silva, Stephanie Baptist and Mark Sealy eds., Rotimi Fani-Kayode (1955–1989) (London: Tiwani Contemporary, 2014)
- Yomi Ola, 'Satirizing From the Heart of the Empire: Rotimi Fani-Kayode and Yinka Shonibare', in Satires of Power in Yoruba Visual Culture (Durham: Carolina Academic Press, 2013) pp. 185-217, 231-241
- Kevin Dumouchelle, 'Beyond the Body Boundary: Queer(y)ing the Photographs of Rotimi Fani-Kayode and Samuel Fosso', in Charlotte Barker ed., Expressions of the Body: Representations in African Text and Image (Oxford: Peter Lang, 2009) pp. 63-93
- Angela K. Pizzolato, Mythologising the Body: Re-viewing Rotimi Fani-Kayode's Photography (MA Thesis, University of Denver, 2006)
- Steven Nelson, 'Transgressive Transcendence in the Photographs of Rotimi Fani-Kayode', Art Journal, Vol. 64, No. 1, 2005, pp. 4-19
- Klaus Schneider and Kay Schaefer eds., Sexuality and Death: AIDS in Contemporary African Art (Cologne: Rautenstrauch-Joest-Museum, 2003)
- Mora J. Beauchamp-Byrd and M. Franklin Sirmans eds., Transforming the Crown: African, Asian and Caribbean Artists in Britain, 1966–1996 (New York: The Franklin H. Williams Caribbean Cultural Centre, 1997)
- Mark Sealy and Jean Loup Pivin eds., Rotimi Fani-Kayode & Alex Hirst (Paris: Revue Noire and London: Autograph, 1996)
- Octavio Zaya, 'On Three Counts I Am an Outsider: The Work of Rotimi Fani-Kayode', Nka: Journal of Contemporary African Art, Vol. 4, No. 1, 1996, pp. 24-72
- Mark Sealy, Communion: Rotimi Fani-Kayode, 1955–1989 (York: Impressions, 1995)
- Wendy Grossman, Tradition and Transformation in African Photography: From Yoruba Ritual to Rotimi Fani-Kayode (MA Thesis, University of Maryland at College Park, 1993)
- Alex Hirst, The Last Supper: A Creative Farewell to Rotimi Fani-Kayode (Wolverhampton: Light House Media Centre, 1992)
- David Bailey, 'Photographic Animateur: The Photographs of Rotimi Fani-Kayode in Relation to Black Photographic Practice', Third Text, No. 13, 1991, pp. 51-62
- Jean Loup Pivin, African Photographers / Photographes Noirs (Paris: Editions Bleu Outremer, 1991)
- Tessa Boffin and Sunil Gupta, Ecstatic Antibodies: Resisting the AIDS Mythology (London: Rivers Oram Press, 1990)
- Rotimi Fani-Kayode, Black Male/White Male (London: GMP, 1988)
Public collections
Related organisations
- Association of Black Photographers (now Autograph BP), London (co-founder and first chair)
- Black Audio Film Collective, London (member)
- Brighton College (student)
- Georgetown University, Washington D.C. (student, Fine Arts and Economics)
- Millfield School (student)
- Pratt Institute, New York (student, MFA in Fine Arts and Photography)
- Seabright College (student)
Related web links
- Hales Gallery
- Iwona Blazwick on Rotimi Fani-Kayode – part of the 'Alternative History of Art' series on BBC Radio 4, 17 March 2018
- J. Wilson, Celebrating Queer Black Photography Pioneer, Rotimi Fani-Kayode
- L. Darling, Rotimi Fani-Kayode, Pictures Worth a Thousand Words
- M. Sealy, Portfolio: Rotimi Fani-Kayode – Desire In Exile, Tate Etc., 26 October 2018
- Press release on Rotimi Fani-Kayode's exhibition at Tiwani Contemporary, London, 2014
- Queer heritage south
- Ruppert Gabriel's movie 'Rage & Desire' dedicated to Rotimi Fani-Kayode
- Walther Collection
- Writing in Relation – R. Fani-Kayode
Selected exhibitions
- Rotimi Fani-Kayode. Tranquility of Communion, Hales New York (2021)
- Masculinities: Liberation Through Photography, Barbican Art Gallery, London (2020)
- Intimacy, Activism and AIDS, Tate Modern, London (2019)
- Rotimi Fani-Kayode (1955–1989), Light Work, Syracuse University Art Galleries, New York, USA (2015)
- Iziko South African National Gallery, Cape Town, South Africa (2014)
- Rotimi Fani-Kayode (1955–1989), Tiwani Contemporary, London (2014)
- ARS 11, Kiasma-Museum of Contemporary Art, Helsinki, Finland (2011)
- Rivington Place, London (2011)
- Harvard University, USA (2009)
- Sexuality and Death: AIDS in Contemporary African Art, Rautenstrauch-Joest-Museum, Cologne (2003)
- African Pavilion at the 50th Venice Biennale, Venice, Italy (2003)
- Communion – Selected Works, Café Gallery, London (1999)
- In/Sight African Photographers, 1940 to the Present, Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum, New York (1996)
- Ecstatic Antibodies: Resisting the AIDS Mythology, Impressions Gallery of Photography, York (1990)
- Ikon Gallery Birmingham and Battersea Arts Center, London (1990)
- US/UK Photography Exchange, Camerawork, London and Jamaica Arts Centre, New York (1989)
- Rotimi Fani-Kayode, Photographer (1955–1989): Retrospective, 198 Gallery, London (1989)
- Present Times, Brixton Art Gallery, London (1988)
- North-South Exposures (an Autograph exhibition), House of Commons, London (1988)
- The Invisible Man, Goldsmith's Gallery, London (1988)
- Black and White Males, Submarine Gallery, London (1988)
- Misfits, Oval House Gallery, London (1987)
- Yoruba Light for Modern Living, Riverside Studios, London (1986)
- Same Difference, Camerawork, London (1986)
- Sacred and Profane Love, South West Arts, London (1985)
