spent the afternoon at the national gallery of art in uyo, sampling some of the best the town has to offer in painting, sculpture, ceramics, and wood carving. near the end of the tour, spent over an hour at the studio observing lead sculptor ani udosen instruct a handful of apprentices, all fine arts students from the university of uyo, on fiberglass sculpting technique.

udosen, one of ben ekanem's former students, is the artist behind a number of roundabout sculptures in town and at UniUyo, the giant "reading lady" in front of Akpabio's famed e-Library (pictured below)--which, after two years of construction, has yet to be launched--and a handful of other sculptures throughout Calabar. it was serendipitous that we met since i've been trying to determine the artist(s) behind many of these works.



i asked a lot of questions and he was very accommodating. even shared his flash drive full of pictures. i was amazed to see the eight-meter-tall metal frame he and his crew erected before molding the "reading lady" out of cement. i'm itching for a bust of myself--bronzed. :) --AL.