Spotlight Hub in homage to The spirit of coffee

By : Gregory Austin Nwakunor

Date: 26 November 2025 1:57am WAT

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The Spirit of Coffee

The Spirit of Coffee

Drinking coffee is considered as one of the most cost-effective means of attaining a healthy lifestyle, especially the morning ritual of brewing a cup, the smell that perks you up before you take a sip and, of course, the flavour: They all make it one of the favourite beverages.

Mind of the Masters, in collaboration with the West African Specialty Coffee Association (WASCA) and NK Art Space, is set to create a space for the rich, sensory world of coffee in a show, titled, The Spirit of Coffee.

WASCA is a movement uniting the people behind Africa’s coffee story from smallholder farmers tending their fields to roasters perfecting each batch, baristas crafting unforgettable experiences. The association acts as a bridge between tradition and innovation, honouring the rich heritage of African coffee, its farmers, and its role in local communities. It drives the coffee industry forward through modern training, global standards, and sustainable practices that ensure Africa’s coffee stands proudly on the world stage.

The show, which runs from November 29 to December 12, 2025, at The Spotlight Hub, Victoria Island, Lagos, aims to celebrate and promote coffee culture in Nigeria through art. The show invites you to slow down, sip deeply and experience coffee itself and its creatives interrogation.

Africa is widely recognised as the birthplace of coffee cultivation. However, despite its rich heritage and favourable growing conditions, the continent has not fully leveraged the vast economic potential of coffee.

The aroma rises, dark and rich, meeting the breath of its beholder. The work portrays the essence of coffee as more than just a drink but as a ritual of memory.

Speaking on the show, CEO of Mind of the Masters, Larry Segun-Lean, said the show seeks to create awareness about coffee culture in Nigeria, noting that coffee is one of the most traded commodities in the world, yet Nigeria is losing potential revenue from it.

According to him, “Brazil is regarded as the epicentre of coffee and the biggest exporter globally. In Africa, Uganda is the largest exporter of coffee as of May 2025 higher than Ethiopia’s figures. Major market destinations include Italy, Germany, India, and China, with Europe being the largest single market.”

Also speaking, the Founder of NK Art Space, Tobi Nancy Keshinro, said the exhibition would highlight the health benefits of coffee, such as reducing high blood pressure, lowering the risk of type 2 diabetes, improving liver health, enhancing brain function, and protecting against neuro-degenerative diseases like Alzheimer’s and Parkinson’s.

The curator of the exhibition, who is gradually becoming a reference point to such curatorial ingenuity, added that coffee is rich in antioxidants, which protect cells from damage and reduce inflammation. However, moderation is key, as high caffeine intake can disrupt sleep, and individual tolerance varies.

To capture the coffee sonata, Lenrie Preks,a professional artist with over three decades of experience and a graduate of the Federal Polytechnic, Auchi,will showcase 20 artworks curated by Mind of the Masters and NK Art Space.

These works reflect the richness, benefits, and culture of coffee through the medium of art. Each work on display represents a personal journey of discovery, daily life experience and captured narratives in pigment, texture and forms and the audience is left with a lasting impression that pays homage to sight and taste.

Preks is a two-time winner of the Kano State History and Culture Bureau Competition. He won in 1991 and 1992. He looks at various ways of sharing the communion: black, white, with or without sugar. He gives the desired feeling.

The master artist’s resume is sure a good lever for the show. He attended Roman Catholic Mission (R.C.M) Primary School,Warri, between 1968 and 1974. Urhobo College, Effurun, Warri. (U.C.E) 1975 wnd 1980. Auchi Polytechnic, 1981-82 session – 1986-87 session.

Some of the works include, The Spirit of Coffee, mixed media on canvas. Year 2025. The Preks captures the image of a woman with a cup of coffee. She does not drink. She just listens. With her hat tilted low and her skin painted in ancestral blue, the woman holds her coffee like a sacred offering. Steam curls around her like a whispered prayer. In that moment, time slows.

Preks captures triumphantly not just a portrait but a ritual. The coffee is warmth, memory, and presence. Her beads, her stillness, her gaze inward , all speak of quiet strength, of culture held close, of mornings that begin with intention.

This is not a painting to pass by. It is one to sit with.

In another work, Coffee Fruity, oil on canvas (2025), Preks interrogates the mix of nature. In the cool hush of dawn, before the world stirs, a pair of hands reaches for ripeness. Not just for the fruit but for a promise. Coffee Fruity captures this quiet ritual, where labour becomes poetry and patience yields sweetness.

“Each cherry plump, red, glistening, holds the potential of warmth in a distant cup. But here, in this frame, it is still tethered to the earth, kissed by dew, nurtured by time. The hands, rendered with tenderness and strength, tell of seasons gone by. They are calloused, yes, but reverent, like someone plucking joy, not just produce,” said Preks.

“This is not merely a scene. It is a meditation on sustenance, dignity, and the sacred bond between grower and ground. The artist invites us to taste the story behind every sip. For in the act of harvesting, there is something divine which is a communion between toil and fruit, body and soil.”

This piece is for those who understand that behind every cup of coffee lies an unseen devotion. Coffee Fruity is a rare homage to the hands that make the morning brew possible. A jewel for those who savor depth, labour, and colour in full bloom.

In Coffee Blitz (2025), two faceless beings meet in silence, yet speak volumes. Their eyes are closed, but their souls are awake — stirred not by words, but by the quiet thunder of shared ritual.

Here, the table is no longer a table — it’s a battlefield of colour, a chessboard of feeling. Each patch of red, yellow, and blue is a territory of thought, a square of memory. The cups, boldly checkered and clutched with resolve, become chalices of truth. One holds something dark and brooding. The other, golden — perhaps hope. Or resolve. Or dawn. Their faces — angular, geometric, unguarded — suggest that life has not been smooth. It’s been fractured, folded, and reassembled. Yet in this moment, there is unity. The blitz is not chaos — it is clarity.

Coffee Blitz is the morning after a long night of dreaming. It is about what we hold in our hands when the noise quiets.

It is about being fully present — one sip at a time.

In Flavour of Coffee, acrylic on canvas, it begins with silence. The world recedes—its noise, its haste, its heaviness—and all that remains is a cup held tenderly, as if it were a secret. The aroma rises, dark and rich, meeting the breath of its beholder. Here, in this suspended moment, the coffee becomes more than a drink—it becomes a ritual of memory, of morning light, of stories once whispered across kitchen tables.

Each brushstroke hums with warmth. Each hue tells a tale of longing and arrival. The red cup, radiant and steady, is the only anchor in a swirling sea of texture and time.

This is not just a painting. It is a portrait of presence. A celebration of stillness. A hymn to the ordinary act that makes life extraordinary.

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