Tife Sonaike is Reimagining Nollywood Posters through His “Nollywood Reimagined” Series

In March 2026, Nigerian visual artist, Tife Sonaike, started a visual series tagged Nollywood Reimagined where he focuses on creating new, alternative, and art-inclined posters for selected Old Nollywood films. The series has produced reimagined posters of Teco Benson’s State of Emergency, Tade Ogidan’s Diamond Ring, Gbenga Adewusi’s Lepa Shandy, and Lancelot Oduwa Imaseun’s Issakaba. For Tife, this is a deliberate act of creating a modern reimagination and engagement in the films and their iconic posters. According to the artist, the series isn’t concerned with replacing the old posters but to give them a new and lasting visual identity. 

In this interview with Culture Custodian, Sonaike speaks about the motivation for the series, his intent to build a visual archive for Nollywood, and his thoughts on Old Nollywood aesthetics. 

This interview has been edited for brevity and clarity. 

You describe yourself as a visual archivist and your work is often a medley of African history, memory, and visual culture. What does visual archiving look like in practice for you? And, where did that instinct come from and why is it important to your artistic practice? 

For me, visual archiving is about collecting fragments, images, memories, cultural cues, and turning them into narratives that feel alive in the present. The instinct comes from realizing how much of our visual history isn’t formally documented, so my work is a way to preserve those moments and reshape them on our own terms.

The Nollywood Reimagined series centers on Old Nollywood titles. What was your earliest memory of Old Nollywood, and as a now matured artist, what are your critical thoughts about its aesthetics? 

My earliest memories of Old Nollywood were movies like End Of The Wicked, Lepashandy, Beyonce & Rihanna, and others. Very unfiltered storytelling, a bit chaotic, but deeply rooted in the culture of that time. Looking at it now, I appreciate the realness, the aesthetics were rough, but it reminds me that authenticity will always hit harder than perfection.

There’s a growing number of Nigerian artists who are actively trying to reckon with and recover Nollywood and Nigerian early history. Do you see Nollywood Reimagined as part of that broader conversation? 

Yeah, definitely. Nollywood Reimagined feels like part of that same energy, looking back but with intention.

Where did the idea for the Nollywood Reimagined series actually come from, and why posters specifically? 

It came  from leaning deeper into my Nigerian identity and reinterpreting stories I’m already connected to through my style. Posters felt right because illustration is my forte, and they’re the first glimpse into a film’s world, so it’s the perfect space to reimagine.

You have worked on Teco Benson’s State of Emergency, Tade Ogidan’s Diamond Ring, Lancelot Oduwa Imasuen’s Isakaba, and Gbenga Adewusi’s Lepashandy. Walk us through your selection process. And when you decide on a film, what are you hoping to capture with your reimagined posters? 

There’s no strict order to how I pick the films, I usually start with ones I’m already familiar with, then mix in recommendations I get from people online. When I choose a film, what I’m really trying to do with the poster is capture its overall tone, almost like compressing all the key moments and emotions into a single canvas.

Old Nollywood’s posters have a vibrant visual language. Are you keen about drawing any artistic affiliation or inspiration from Old Nollywood, or it’s a complete break from that Old Nollywood aesthetics? 

It’s not a complete break, it’s more of a conscious evolution. Old Nollywood had this bold, chaotic energy I really respect. I’m not replicating it, but I’m still connected to that spirit, just translating it through more intentional design, cleaner forms, and a more refined visual language. In a way, I see it as taking the emotional core of Old Nollywood and interpreting it through my own lens.

In Old and contemporary Nollywood, film posters are primarily promotional. Your reimagined posters occupy an interesting dual role: promotional tools and art objects. Do you think that utilitarian origin is part of why Nollywood posters have hitherto been visually undervalued? And how do you contextualise your work which asks us to look at them differently not as advertisements, but as cultural documents?

Yes, partly. Nollywood posters were built primarily to sell the film, not to be preserved, so they got treated as disposable visuals rather than something to study or archive. My work leans into that history but slows it down, treating each piece like a snapshot of its time.

Where do you think the poster sits in the current Nollywood ecosystem? Has the industry overcorrected, or is the evolution healthy?

It’s hard to place it just yet, it’s still very early in the project, so I can’t really gauge where it sits or what it says about Nollywood’s direction.

There’s been positive responses to the series. What do you make of the responses so far? 

It’s been really encouraging to see people connect with the work not just visually, but on a deeper level. It’s a strong sign to keep pushing further.

What is/are the plan(s) after concluding the Nollywood Reimagined series?

I’m planning to bring the project into a physical space, either along the way or at the end, through an exhibition that gathers Nollywood lovers. The idea is to create a moment where the work lives beyond the screen, and hopefully have directors and actors around to experience and engage with it too.