Skunder Boghossian

The first contemporary African artist to have his work purchased by the Museum of Modern Art.

Skunder Boghossian was born in Addis Ababa in 1937 and died in Washington DC. in 2003.

He studied art informally at Tafari Mekonnen secondary school. In 1954 - 55 Skunder won the second prize at an art exhibition held as part of HIM, Haile Selalssies’s jubilee Anniversary Celebration. As a result he was awarded an imperial scholarship to study in London. He attended St. Martin’s School, The Central School, and The Slade School of fine Art in London. In 1957 he moved to Paris and spent nine years studying and teaching. He studied at the Ecole Nationale Superieure de Beaux-are and the Académie de la Grande Chaumière. Skunder’s compositions from the Paris years, with their kaleidoscopic layering of form, meaning, color and design, reflects his interest in pan-African themes as well as his Ethiopian heritage.

Skunder returned to Addis Ababa in 1966 and joined the faculty at the Addis Ababa school of fine Arts until 1969. In 1970 he emigrated to the United States, teaching at Howard University from 1972 until 2001. Although he taught in Ethiopia for only three years Skunder’s impact was lasting.

Early in his career Skunder’s work entered the collection of the Muse`e d`Art modern de la ville de Paris and the museum of modern Art in New York. Boghossian was the first contemporary African artist to have his work purchased by the Museum of Modern Art; his paintings are also in the collections of the National Museum of African Art in Washington, DC. His paintings talk about supernatural forces, mystical transformations, filled with imagery of sprit and nightmarish metamorphoses, political opposition, violence, and destruction as in the 1972 painting DMZ (for demilitarized zone) in the collection of Howard University museum.

The End of the Beginning Skunder Boghossian (1937 -2003) , 1972-73, Oil on Canvas, 122.60 cm by 170.20 cm, National Museum of Africa Art, Smithsonian Institution

the first women Included In the Art collection of the National Museum of Ethiopia.

Desta Hagos

Desta Hagos was born in Adwa in the Tigray region of northern Ethiopia 1952. She moved to Addis Ababa at age nine to attend boarding school and later attended the prestigious Empress Menen High school, a school of girls. When she received her diploma from the Addis Ababa Fine Arts School in 1969, Desta’s graduation exhibition was the first solo show by a woman artist in Ethiopia. She then received her BFA from California Lutheran University in 1973. She was the first woman artist to be represented in the collection of the National Museum of Ethiopia.

The Stage, Desta Hagos, 83.8 cm x 108.9cm Oil and collage on board, collection of Desta Hagos.