KISUMU-BASED ARTIST ONDULA RESTORES SIKH SCULPTURE

Controversial Kisumu Sikh sculpture restored

Ondula reconstructed sculpture at stone quarry in Kisiani. File Photo 

 

By MARGARETTA WA GACHERU

Posted  Thursday, May 8   2014 at  17:07

Oshoto Ondula had heard about the so called ‘prophesy’ made by one outspoken Bishop that an evil idol would come to Kisumu, brought by ‘devil worshippers’. But he paid no heed to the rumor.

The seasoned sculptor (who President Moi commissioned to create a Carrera marble eagle for Queen Elizabeth who came to Kenya in the 1980s) had been busy sculpting the peace monument commissioned by Kisumu’s Sikh community to commemorate the centenary of their Siri Guru Singh Sabha Temple.

 Oshoto Luke Ondula stands with his restored cement and steel Peace sculpture in Kisiani, Kisumu at a stone quarry owned by Sikh Temple chairman SCS Hayer. Pix by Margaretta wa Gacheru

“We also wanted to play our part in celebrating Kenya at 50,” said S.C.S.  Hayer, Chairman of Kisumu’s Siri Guru Singh Sabha and the man who commissioned Ondula.  “We also wanted the monument to signify the unity of all Kenyans, irrespective of their faith.”

It was Ondula’s design to make the five meter cement and reinforced steel sculpture in the shape of someone with their head bowed in prayer.

“It was meant to be a universal image,” said Ondula who was stunned upon hearing that a mob came one night in early February and demolished the statue.

But for the Kisumu-based sculptor who created the bronze statue of Tom Mboya that now stands erect in Nairobi’s CBD across from the Hilton Hotel, the mob’s response to his art was a blow.

At the same time, the artist seemed philosophical when we met him last weekend at the opening in Kisumu of The Little Art Gallery.

“I can understand how people with slight knowledge of [contemporary visual] art could misunderstand a figure having no eyes, nose or mouth,” Ondula said who had intentionally made  the  sculpture in a smooth, modernist semi-abstract style so as to symbolize the universality of devotional prayer.

The artist believes some members of the mob must have believed the sculpture was made out of bronze due to its golden hue and sandpaper-smoothed shape.

“I think they thought the peace monument was made out of metal which they could then sell as scrap,” he said. “There was also a rumor that the Sikhs had buried treasure deep inside the monument which gave them added incentive to destroy it,” he added.

Fortunately, Ondula didn’t have to mourn the demise of the monument for long.

The Sikhs re-commissioned him to reconstruct his sculpture and also finish work on the two life-sized cement lions that are also part of the installation.

“We hadn’t even completed installing the peace monument when it was vandalized,” said Mr Hayer who was and still is committed to completing the work. He’s so committed, in fact, that he transported the remains of the sculpture to his company’s stone quarry in Kisiani outside Kisumu where Ondula has been working steadily since then.

“The place is like an artist’s sanctuary,” he said, referring to the fact that much of the quarry has been reclaimed after the stone was removed. Then it was planted with beautiful trees of all types which now blanket the land and create what Onduka called a ‘heavenly’ ever-green garden.

Traveling to Kisiani last weekend with Ondula and Mr Hayer’s cousin, Mohinder Nagra, we saw how exquisitely the artist had reclaimed his artwork.

”It was mainly the head and hands that were damaged,” he said, having restored the statue which he hopes to put it back at the roundabout next to the Sikh Temple along with his lions.

“But before I even think of re-installing the peace monument, I want to complete my sculpture of Jaramogi Oginga Odinga,” he said. “My hope is that it will give the people a better grasp of what public art can mean for the community.”

Nonetheless, there are locals who sincerely doubt the Sikhs’ peace monument will ever be accepted by the public in Kisumu.

“The monument will remain a symbol of Asians’ economic dominance in the town, and as such, it may never serve as a symbol of unity as the Sikhs would wish,” said one life-long Kisumu resident. “And if it isn’t destroyed again, it will simply stand as a divisive symbol of inequality between the Asians and African communities.”

Ondula, who has been sculpting since he was ten years old, isn’t nearly as negative as the critics. “Kisumu is changing rapidly and so are the people,” he said, confident that once they see a monument dedicated to Jaramogi their minds will be opened and accepting of other communities’ desire to beautify their city.

In the meantime, the one redeeming feature of the mob assault on a remarkable work of contemporary Kenyan art is that it’s drawn attention to one of Kenya’s finest sculptors whose first Nairobi exhibition was back in 1979 at African Heritage Pan African Gallery.