Tayo Adenaike is a watercolourist from the Nsukka School. He was born in Warri to Yoruba parents and had his first formal art lessons at Federal Government College, Warri. He studied at the University of Nigeria, Nsukka, where he earned a BA in 1979 and an MFA in 1982. His main teacher there was Obiora Udechukwu. Adenaike calls himself a third-generation Nsukka painter, after Uche Okeke and Chike Aniakor and then Udechukwu. Unusually, he has never painted full time. He built a career in advertising in Enugu, co-founding and leading creative work at agencies there, and he paints at night and at weekends. His watercolours are delicate and controlled. He layers transparent washes and combines them with fine uli, akika and nsibidi line motifs. His subjects are often figures, masquerades and dreamlike scenes, many drawn from memories of his Yoruba childhood. He is widely seen as one of Nigeria's leading watercolour painters. He has had about eighteen solo shows and many group exhibitions in Nigeria, the US, the UK and Germany, including the Smithsonian's Africa Now exhibition. In Lagos he is represented by SMO Contemporary Art and Ko Artspace.
School or movement: Nsukka School / Uli revival (third generation).
Influenced by Obiora Udechukwu, Uche Okeke, Chike Aniakor, Uli and akika design, Nsibidi, Yoruba childhood memories.
