England meets Nigeria in unique collaboration

Typographer, sleeve designer and artist ‘Swifty’ will be remixing and sampling the work of pioneering Nigerian artist, Ghariokwu Lemi, to promote a landmark exhibition as part of this year’s BASS Festival.

Best-known for pioneering the look of the Acid Jazz movement of the 1990’s and driving the creative direction for Straight No Chaser magazine, Swifty is working with BASS Festival to design a suite of promotional materials for an exhibition featuring Lemi’s album cover designs. The exhibition is showing at Rich Mix, London from 8th June – 6th July as part of the month-long festival.

Lemi’s thirty-five year career saw him design over 2000 album covers for some of the world’s most renowned musicians. Most notably was his work for Afrobeat star and political activist Fela Kuti, who Lemi designed nearly thirty album covers for.

The Anglo-African collaboration sees Swifty incorporating some of the iconic images seen across Lemi’s album sleeves, and also some of his more personal philosophies and ideals like one of Lemi’s first sketchbook designs, which shows the connection between man, woman and power. This image is also being sold as an exhibition poster, with a percentage of proceeds going to War Child, the international charity that protects children in war-torn countries. Swifty has also sampled a number of African-inspired fonts after taking inspiration from Lemi’s designs.

BASS Festival is taking place for the fourth consecutive year and will see over twenty events across London and the Midlands. These will range from live music, theatre and dance performances, to art exhibitions, film screenings and master classes; all exploring this year’s theme of ‘Inspired by Africa’. For more info on BASS Festival 2009, visit www.bassfestival.co.uk.