Ghanaian sculptor, textile and installation artist Ibrahim Mahama has won the inaugural Sam Gilliam Award, an award created last year by the Dia Art Foundation and the Sam Gilliam Foundation in honor of the late artist’s legacy. Mahama will receive $75,000 and appear in a public program at Dia this fall. The prize will be awarded annually until 2033.
“My mentor Kąrî’káchä Seid’ou first introduced me to Gilliam’s important work as a student, and he has had a profound influence on me ever since,” Mahama said in a statement. “The most important aspect of any community is the sharing of their many gifts, even if they are born from precarity, because within that point we extend freedom to all forms of life.”
Ibrahim Mahama, TRANSFER(S)Kunsthalle Osnabrück, Germany, July 8 to October 1, 2023 © artist Photo © Friso Gentsch/Lucie Marsmann/Angela von Brill
Mahama was chosen by a panel of five people, including Gilliam’s widow and the president of his foundation, Annie Gawla; Yale Center for British Art director Courtney J. Martin; Emiliano Valdés, Chief Curator of the Modern Art Museum of Medellín; Chisenhale Gallery director Zoé Whitley; and Jordan Carter, curator of Dia. Notable in Mahama’s selection was the increasingly ambitious nature of his work—both in scale and complexity—as well as the community nature of many of the projects he collaborates with in his native Ghana with a wide range of authors.
“Mahama champions collaboration in her work and, as she repurposes the materials she collects and recycles into artworks, she revitalizes her communities, turning abandoned structures into institutions for gathering, learning, art-making and collective growth,” Jessica Morgan, Director of Dia. director, said in a statement. “This award recognizes both sides of his sophisticated practice.”
Ibrahim Mahama, Purple Hibiscus2023-24 Photo: Ibrahim Mahama, Red Clay Tamale, Barbican Centre, London and White Cube
Using reclaimed materials including fabrics and found objects, Mahama creates works that vary dramatically in tone and scale, from wall-based pieces with colorful textiles to large-scale installations that comment on colonialism and industry. He is also known for extensive public projects in which building facades are covered with textiles produced in collaboration with numerous Ghanaian artisans. Next month he will gather London’s Barbican Center with such a work, a new textile commission.
Mahama’s art has been included in major international exhibitions around the world in recent years, including the recent closed edition of Desert X AlUla in Saudi Arabia; the 2023 editions of the Sharjah Biennale, the São Paulo Biennale and the Venice Architecture Biennale; Ghana Pavilion at the 2019 Venice Biennale; and Documenta in 2017. He is represented by White Cube and had his last solo exhibition with the gallery in Hong Kong space in 2022.
