Despite his Lagos-boy look and well-built frame, sculptor Luke Osaro clearly knows his onions when it comes to his cultural milieu. His Bonded Stone depiction of Oba Ovonramwen is a clear expression of this understanding.

Words: Ireho Aito | Don’t Keep Your Art in the Finger! Artwork and photographs courtesy Luke Osaro

Luke Osaro’s Oba Ovonramwen Bonded Stone, measuring 84 cm, surfaced on a WhatsApp platform and quickly captured the attention of art enthusiasts. Viewers were drawn to Osaro’s extensive, deep etching, which depicts a monarch whose tale of empire, downfall, and the sacking of his kingdom has become embedded in Nigeria’s historical firmament.

Draws deeply from the historical memory of Oba Ovonramwen Nogbaisi, the last independent Oba of Benin before the British punitive expedition of 1897. He reigned from 1888 to 1897

Luke Osaro rendered the king’s glowing presence in bonded stone, the sculpture is both a monument and form of meditation while its material density echoing endurance, its form carrying the weight of rupture, exile, and the unresolved afterlife of colonial violence. Osaro does not merely sculpt a historical figure; he summons a presence, one that speaks to the resilience of Benin kingship and the spiritual authority that outlived conquest.

Born of Edo heritage and trained at Obafemi Awolowo University, Ile-Ife, Luke Osaro has, since 2004, maintained a committed full-time studio practice. He lives and works from Alimosho, a suburb on the Lagos Mainland whose raw energy mirrors the intensity and ambition of his sculptural vision. A community that he knows just like the back of his palms. He could tell why some of the institutions exist in such a big community with intra – communities within the Alimosho ecosystem. He runs his studio along the Airforce Base road and he once revealed how the road was constructed by the military administration of General Ibrahim Babangida.

From this base, Osaro has built an extensive catalogue of work across bonded stone, bronze, and fiberglass, consistently interrogating themes of royalty, identity, memory, and collective African experience. And this particular drive of inspiration has made him a royal himself. Luke Osaro commands his technique to listen to him and which he enjoys everytime.

The conceptual undercurrent of Oba Ovonramwen aligns with Osaro’s long-standing engagement with symbols of authority and cultural continuity, evident in earlier bodies of work that reimagine crowns, regalia, and the human figure as sites of historical negotiation. His practice situates tradition not as nostalgia, but as a living, contested space, and one that must be revisited, questioned, and reasserted in contemporary form.

This sculptural narrative finds resonance within broader cultural efforts to revisit the events of 1897. Notably, Nollywood filmmaker Lancelot Oduwa Imasuen, through his epic film Invasion 1897, has played a pivotal role in reclaiming Benin history from indigenous perspectives, reframing resistance and historical justice for popular and scholarly audiences alike. The dialogue is further deepened by the intellectual and artistic contributions of Professor Peju Layiwola, whose work foregrounds restitution, memory, and the ethical reckoning of colonial collections.

Osaro’s career is marked by extensive exhibitions and active participation in art fairs and festivals, including Sculptors Odyssey at the ArtMiabo Art Festival, where his monumental language finds public and curatorial engagement. His collaborations and significant commissioned works form a substantial part of his practice, extending his sculptural presence into private, institutional, and civic spaces.

Together, Bonded Stone and its surrounding cultural references has positioned Luke Osaro not only as a sculptor of form, but as a custodian of memory. He is the one who carves history into contemporary consciousness.

And in Oba Ovonramwen, the past is neither sealed nor silent. Rather, it is bonded, enduring, and insistently present.

iBAND Magazine, Celebrating Visual Arts from the Original.
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