He is the python. He gives nothing, and takes the endgame. The Grandmaster II is the second of the pair, and the answer to the first. He is an elder at the same board — an old man, grey-bearded, rendered in warm browns and the same indigo-and-white Yoruba cloth.
The work was made with Tunde Onakoya, founder of Chess in Slums Africa — the non-profit that teaches chess to children in Nigeria's underserved communities and carries them, through the game, toward scholarships and school. Both artists signed both paintings. Proceeds from this acquisition goes to Chess in Slums Africa, and moves another child to a board.