Artist Ibrahim Mahama tops ArtReview’s Power 100 list, the 24th annual ranking of the people who shaped the art world over the past year.
Image above: Ibrahim Mahama © White Cube (George Darrell) Courtesy the artist.
Over the past decade, the Ghanaian artist has become known for large installations, often using jute sacks and textile remnants – such as fabric scraps from the Ghanaian cocoa industry – which teams sew together into huge quilts that he then drapes over buildings. Mahama is the first African to top the Power 100 list. His ranking is the result of his role as an artist and creator of infrastructures that help other artists realise their visions.
Mahama’s work addresses issues such as labour, resource extraction and exploitation. He uses his position in the global art world to reflect on these issues in practical ways by establishing educational and art institutions and building collaborative partnerships. In recent years, Mahama has invested his sales proceeds from blue-chip galleries in a number of institutions in his hometown of Tamale: the Red Clay Studio, the Savannah Centre for Contemporary Art (SCCA) and Nkrumah Volini, which host residencies, student projects, children’s workshops and exhibitions. As older models of museums and galleries struggle, new forms of support and dissemination of art are important issues for the present and the near future. Mahama symbolises how many artists today are taking control of production and distribution channels.
This year’s top ten is dominated in part by artists who, like Mahama, are creating their own infrastructure, reflecting a desire to bring art-making closer to the art world. Egyptian artist Wael Shawky (ranked 4th) is ‘curating’ an art fair, while Singaporean artist Ho Tzu Nyen (5th) is curating a biennial. Others on the list have founded residency programmes (Mark Bradford at number 12, Yinka Shonibare at number 14, Tracey Emin at number 100) or established their own art centres and schools (Wolfgang Tillmans at number 10, Theaster Gates at number 16, Marina Abramovic at number 28, Emily Jacir at number 48, Dalton Paula at number 68, RAQS Media Collective at number 76) or are creating new ecosystems through biennials and festivals (Sammy Baloji at number 31, Bose Krishnamachari at number 52). In addition, there are groups such as Forensic Architecture (9), blaxTARLINES (69) and Cercle d’Art des Travailleurs de Plantation Congolaise (82), which are redefining how their work should be disseminated and who their audience should be. Many of these individuals or groups operate in places and contexts outside the traditional centres of commercial, governmental and philanthropic resources.
The increasing presence of Gulf states at the top of this list (Sheikha Al-Mayassa bint Hamad bin Khalifa Al-Thani in second place, Sheikha Hoor Al Qasimi in third place, Badr bin Abdullah Al Saud at number 21) reflects another form of institution building, whereby the enormous resources they invest in art and culture both shift the focus of their carbon-centric economies and recognise art as a means of enhancing a national brand. Amidst the culture wars and austerity measures raging in old arts centres such as the US, Germany and the UK, the Arab world is increasingly becoming a platform from which artists and curators can expand their work.
This change also recognises the fact that museums and galleries are currently undergoing radical change. In many traditional art centres, museums are at an impasse in terms of funding and programming, there is concern about the closure of so many well-known medium-sized galleries, and many of the renowned mega-gallerists are reporting dramatic losses in profits (according to newspaper reports, in some regions by up to almost 90 per cent). Over the past 12 months, many art patrons (such as Miuccia Prada (32), Bernard Arnault (56), François Pinault (58) and Han Nefkens (78)) have bypassed the traditional middlemen and instead provided direct financial support to artists through their own private institutions or production funds. The galleries that remain on ArtReview’s list (and there are certainly fewer than in the past) are doing more than just selling art, such as David Zwirner (67) with his publishing activities, Emmanuel Perrotin (87) with his pop and fashion crossovers, and Hauser & Wirth (57), Prateek Raja & Priyanka Raja of Experimenter (59) and Liza Essers of Goodman (71) with their educational programmes.
The rest of the top spots on the list also reflect our current situation and deal with issues such as censorship and oppression: artists, curators and thinkers who are concerned with representation and technology and at the same time ask what art can achieve in times of conflict.
The Power 100 is compiled by a jury of around 30 people from all over the world and from all areas of the art world, who nominate those individuals who have shaped art in their region over the past year. The criteria for inclusion in the Power 100 are that each person has an influence on the art that is currently being created and exhibited, that they have been active in the last 12 months, and that their presence extends beyond the local scene (even if many operate locally, the influence of these local activities can have an international impact). The result is a means of capturing an art world that is not just an economic or aesthetic system, but a complex social system. With this list, ArtReview paints a picture of the network of relationships that shaped the art of 2025.
