Fresco Gallery, West Africa’s first print gallery and a Lagos-based gallery championing printmaking, is redefining the art market by making high-quality, original art more accessible without sacrificing its intrinsic value.
“Beyond the investment value of an art space, art brings joy and beauty into any space or home. We want art lovers to access this while still feeling like they are buying ‘serious’ art,” Ima Ekpo, founder of Fresco Gallery, said.
Traditionally, the art market has been seen as exclusive, often alienating potential buyers who admire certain artists but cannot afford their most sought-after works.
However, Fresco Gallery is working to change that narrative. The gallery addresses the accessibility issue head-on, offering prints and multiples as a more affordable entry point into the world of contemporary African art. The approach ensures that the art market in Africa continues to grow and remain representative of the diverse, evolving tastes of today’s collectors.
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According to the 2023 Artsy Art Collector Insight report, prints and multiples are the third most collected medium, following paintings and sculptures. Fresco Gallery embraces this trend by focusing on collaboration with artists and creating accessible opportunities for collectors. The gallery’s mission is to inspire a new generation of art enthusiasts, while integrating printmaking fully into the African art scene.
“There is so much untapped potential and room to grow,” Ekpo noted. “I have met a lot of well-known and well-collected artists who have a print practice that no one knows about. The narrative is that most Nigerian galleries don’t show prints because Nigerian collectors don’t buy prints. So we have become this space where they can show that practice. We get a lot of messages to this effect.”
