It has long come to the world’s attention that people of accomplishment rarely sit back and let things happen to them; they go out and make things happen
20-year old Alesh Akeem is Nigerian leading pencil artist. A virtuoso in the world of Art, whose remarkable efforts has caught the world’s attention.
Born in Ajegunle- one of the most feared places in Lagos, Nigeria, is Aleshinloye Hakeem Olayinka (Alesh Akeem) who came across art in Primary two as an elementary school pupil, even though they never had a fine art teacher in his ‘Ajegunle-based’ primary school.
The young lad introduced himself to art while borrowing comic books from friends and try to replicate their illustrations. No sooner did he save-up his pocket money as a kid and started buying his own comic books, drawing books and pencils. Little did he know that marked his beginning of investment into a career that would make him a global brand.
Alesh with his Jidenna drawing
According to Alesh Akeem, He fell in love with art because of its possibilities to create his own world and express his imaginations. This drove little Akeem to drawing every day as he would even use drawing as an escape button from house chores and errands which were major distractions for him as a child.
As days, months, and years go by, his passion for art grew beyond imagination. One of the experiences he won’t forget in a hurry was in Junior Secondary School Two (JSS2) in an integrated science class. While the teacher taught in class, he was busy drawing and the teacher caught him. He was expecting to receive the beating of his life but to his surprise, the teacher said “Shebi you like to draw abi? Oya come and draw this skeleton from the textbook.” That was a sweet one for him since he had been drawing for a while, only that he was too short for the chalk board so he had to use a class bench to enhance his height. After drawing the skeleton successfully and almost perfectly, it changed the way teachers and other students saw him. He became the ‘official school artist.’
Alesh Akeem presenting art work to Grammy award winner and American musician, Ciara
At age 15, brilliant Akeem got admission offer into Pentecost University (PENTVARS), Ghana to study accounting but couldn’t accept the admission offer due to financial constraints; same year, he got another offer from to Olabisi Onabanjo University, Ogun state but he also declined the admission due to cultism stories surrounding the institution back then.
After a year he got admission offer into University of Ilorin and Nigeria’s Premier Monotechnic, Nigerian Institute of Journalism (NIJ), Lagos but chose NIJ since it was a professional school and more practical based.
His course mates at NIJ would recall Alesh Akeem littering his entire class walls with art works, many criticized the art works, some appreciated them, while others felt in different.
A course mate said Back then his artworks were always all over the class, and I can remember that only one lecturer encouraged him to continue. In fact the lecturer told him he wants to find a new art piece on the class wall each week when he comes to our class to lecture us. Back then art was just fun for him.”
Alesh Akeem Presenting an hyper realistic portrait to Assistant Commissioner of Police and Commander of Lagos Rapid Response Squad(RRS), ACP Olatunji Disu
His first published work was a cartoon in a campus newsletter which drew some attention to him in the institute; people wanted to meet the boy that did the illustration as it generated little controversy within the students’ environment.
What was fun for Alesh Akeem became a full time profession when things turned a little sour and he had to drop out of Nigerian Institute of Journalism in 2014 due to financial constraint. He deferred his admission due to lack of sponsor.
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