Njideka Akunyili Crosby, 40, is a talented visual artist and the daughter of the late Prof Dora Akunyili. She is currently the most valuable Nigerian artist of all time, and among the most valuable female artists of all nationalities, with her work ‘The Beautyful One’ sold by Christie’s in November 2022 for $4.74 Million.
Her 2nd most expensive work, ‘Bush Babies’, was sold for $3.375 Million in March 2018 by Sotheby’s.
Her first work, an untitled piece, sold for $93.75K in September 2016.
2 months later, in November 2016, her work ‘Drown’, a work showing her reclining with her husband, smashed all expectations by selling for $1.1Million.
She has had 22 works sold at auction over the last 7 years with auction prices achieved ranging from $100K to $4.474 Million.
In, 2016, Njideka Akunyili Crosby was named one of the Financial Times ‘Women of the Year’.
She was awarded the prestigious $625K MacAurthur Fellowship ‘Genius Grant’ in 2017.
In 2018, Njideka designed the mural that wrapped the Museum of Contemporary Art, Grand Avenue, Los Angeles.
Her work “Thriving and Potential, Displaced (Again and Again and…)” (2021) was commissioned for the Met’s exhibition, ‘Before Yesterday We Could Fly’.
Her work was included in the 2022 exhibition Women Painting Women at the Modern Art Museum of Fort Worth.
Her work was also featured in the National Portrait Gallery’s 2023 Kinship exhibit.
Indeed, Njideka is another lady doing Nigeria very proud.