Nigerian artist Tobiloba Awogbemila transforms traditional drums into digital art

Nigerian visual artist Tobiloba Awogbemila created a digital art series that reimagines the Sakara drum, a traditional Yoruba musical instrument, as everyday modern objects.

Using photography and digital manipulation through Adobe Photoshop and Lightroom, Awogbemila produced three specific works: "Sakara Clock, Time Don Pass", "Sakara Radio, Frequency of Home", and "Sakara Light. Light from Home".

The artist combined the physical characteristics of the drum with the functions of a clock, a radio, and a lamp to explore how cultural heritage survives in a modern world. In "Sakara Clock. Time Don Pass", Awogbemila represents the drum as a wall clock. The work uses the circular structure of the instrument as a clock face while incorporating weathered textures and cracks to suggest age and neglect.

The artist uses the title, which means "the time has gone by" in Nigerian Pidgin English, to prompt viewers to consider how much cultural heritage is lost as society focuses on new developments. The second piece, "Sakara Radio. Frequency of Home", transforms the drum into a vintage radio. It features a speaker grille, tuning controls, and a frequency display. Awogbemila links the drum's historical role in community communication to the radio's role in domestic life.

The work includes the phrase "Rhythm of Our Roots" to suggest that connecting with heritage requires active listening, similar to tuning a radio to a specific frequency. The final work, "Sakara Light. Light from Home", presents the drum as a source of illumination. Awogbemila collaborated with an electrician to set up a light bulb and photographed the drum in a low-light setting to create a warm yellow glow.

This piece suggests that cultural identity can serve as a guide for the present. By using digital art to merge these functions, Awogbemila creates images that retain the realistic details of the drum while presenting imaginative new uses for the object.