With label verso: “Wall-Hanging / ‘Applique’ / by / Samuel Ojo / Box 68 OSHOGBO”.

Samuel Ojo Omonaiye formed part of the Oshogbo School of artists that emerged in Southern Nigeria in the postcolonial period between 1962 and 1966. The works created by the group were characterized as trans-genre, tending to combine traditional subject matter and stories with Western artistic media and techniques. Omonaiye was encouraged by Goergina Beier, an English born artist living in Nigeria who was active in the Oshogbo workshops, to pursue art, and he began painting on glass and then stitching together appliquéd tapestries. In his appliquéd tapestries, Omonaiye composed his images by juxtaposing brightly colored and patterned pieces of cotton in a patchwork assemblage. He affixed these pieces, totem-fashion, on a vertical strip of handwoven cloth with embroidery of the sort used on national dress. The large triangular shapes of his early glass paintings were transformed when he began to create whimsical creatures for his wall hangings. Jagged forms, outlined by tiny triangles, vibrate and animate these later compositions. A precedent for his wall hangings exists in Nigerian leather work and the appliquéd heraldry in the Republic of Benin, but his designs are completely different. Omonaiye had a seemingly limitless store of halfanimal, half-spirit creatures. Some winged, some with claw feet, his was an African menagerie of gargoyle-like beasts and dragons, bright and lively rather than fearsome. His large pieces have been exhibited extensively, and his large appliqué Beast Tamer Dancers hangs in the office of the British Broadcasting Corporation. While in his early twenties, Omonaiye contracted tuberculosis and later died, but his spirited imagery still represents a significant aspect of the Oshogbo School.