Lot 18: BABAJIDE OLATUNJI (NIGERIAN, BORN 1989) Portrait of a young woman in prof

BABAJIDE OLATUNJI (NIGERIAN, BORN 1989) Portrait of a young woman in profile signed and dated ‘Babajide B. Olatunji/ ‘13’ (lower left) charcoal and chalk on card 50 x 64cm (19 11/16 x 25 3/16in).

Provenance A private collection, London. Olatunji’s sensitive and hyper-realistic portraits of Nigerian men and women explore the ancient practice of tribal facial markings and scarification. The drawings do not depict real-life individuals; they are drawn from the artist’s imagination. Olatunji’s fictional sitters are given complete histories - personality, character, skin-type and even medical history. The artist’s attention to detail has become his trademark. This portrait is exemplary in its technical proficiency.