Ben Offei Nyarkoh

Artist Bios | Ben Offei Nyarkoh

Biography

Benjamin Offei Nyarko, popularly referred to as BON, was born in 1951 at Atibie/Mpraeso. He is a leading Ghanaian painter and former pupil of Ablade Glover. He obtained his B. A. Art degree (First Class honours) in Painting in 1976 from the College of Art, Kwame Nkrumah University of Science and Technology – KUMASI. From 1979 – 1981, he was awarded a Bulgarian Government Scholarship to read an MFA (Painting) programme at the Nikolai Pavlovich`s Institute of Fine Art in Sofia, Bulgaria.

A dedicated arts educator he has combined teaching with painting and lectures at The College of Art at the University of Science and Technology in Kumasi, Ghana. He was Fulbright scholar in residence in the art department at North Carolina Central University from 1999-2000.

BON’s paintings focus on women in rural communities who, in his words, “toil day by day, some living on the periphery of poverty, yet going about their daily activities with dignity and pride.” For BON, his paintings exhibit a kind of beauty inherent in the simplicity of village life. His work has been exhibited in West Africa, Europe and the USA.

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