BARCLAYS' ATELIER SHOW AT MUSEUM GOES CONTINENTAL INCLUDING KENYANS

Why banks are investing in Kenya’s art

Paul Onditi showcases his art work at Kuona Trust. PHOTO | JEFF ANGOTE 

By  MARGARETTA WA GACHERU, margaretta.gacheru@gmail.com

Posted  Sunday, April 19  2015 at  15:52

Barclays Bank will next year mark a watershed moment with the celebration of its 100th anniversary of operating in Kenya.

Yet in all that time the bank’s primary activities have understandably been in banking, not the arts, particularly not the visual arts.

So it was a truly unique moment when Barclays sponsored the Atelier art competition and exhibition in partnership with Kuona Trust and the National Museums of Kenya where the exhibition was held during the Easter weekend.     

Barclays is not the first bank to support the visual arts in Kenya. Stanbic has, for instance, been supporting the Circle Art Agency (now Gallery) since its inception in 2012. Its banners have been conspicuously displayed during both of Circle’s East African Art Auctions as well as at its other exhibitions.

Earlier in 2012, it was the Standard Chartered Bank that sponsored the first African Portraits exhibition, which was inspired by that bank’s permanent collection of Global Portraiture based in London.

Meanwhile, Commercial Bank of Africa was a major sponsor of the 2013 East African Art Summit organised by the GoDown Art Centre and attended by artists from all over the region.

And way back in the 1990’s, ABN Amro Bank regularly sponsored the Kenya Museum Society’s annual Kenya Art Fair. What’s more, in 2010 Deutsche Bank named the Kenyan artist Wangeci Mutu ‘Artist of the Year’ making her the first artist in the world to win the prestigious award.

But just because other banks recognised the vibrancy, vitality and value of the visual arts in Kenya sometime before Barclays did, doesn’t diminish the moment and the fact that the Barclays’ Atelier competition has opened up amazing – and unprecedented -- opportunities to the six award winner artists whose names were announced on April 2.

At minimum, the six winning Kenyans (selected out of 32 who responded to the call to artists that came out in early February to submit their best works) will have regional exposure when their art is exhibited with the finalists from four other African countries at the prestigious Absa Gallery in Johannesburg.

The Absa has been involved with the Atelier ever since the art competition was established 30 years ago and today its permanent collection is said to be the second largest corporate art collection in the world.

Granted the majority of the art assembled is by South Africans since up until this year, the Atelier was only for artists from that country.

In fact, the Kenya Six are part of a historic sea change in the regional arts scene since 2015 is the first time the bank has extended the competition to include other African countries and not just South Africa alone.

This year Kenya is just one of five African countries whose artists’ works will be displayed in Johannesburg and adjudicated by a professional team of jurists. The other four are Botswana, Ghana, South Africa and Zambia.

“Gradually, the competition will extend to even more countries in the region,” said Raj Shah, Barclays’ head of investment banking based in Nairobi.

“But frankly we chose to begin by reaching out to our most vibrant (and lucrative) local markets, since we want our clients involved in the Atelier as well.”

Admitting the idea of extending the reach of the Atelier competition to other parts of the region was a corporate decision that came from the top, meaning Barclays head office in the UK, Mr Shah said he was pleased to be part of this progressive process.

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In fact, Atelier might have died back in 2006 when Barclays bought Absa (Amalgamated Banks of South Africa), the banking institution that had the vision to see not only the aesthetic but the economic potential of the visual arts 30 years ago.

It was that vision that led to the establishment of Atelier (Art Competition) in spite the country being in the thick of troubled times, and 1985 being when Apartheid was apparently still going strong.

It was thanks to Barclays’ appreciation for what Atelier has achieved over the years, especially in the way it has attracted both national and international attention, and elicited interest from all sectors of South African society, that the bank chose not just to keep the competition going locally but to extend it region-wide.

Again, other corporations in Kenya, not only the banks, have gradually come to see the advantages of supporting the arts (a practice that is frankly done in many other parts of the world).

Probably the best evidence of this trend can be seen in local hotels like the Serena group, the Fairmont chain, the Sankara and the Tribe where Kenyan artists’ paintings, murals and sculptures are visible everywhere.

Restaurants have also come to see the value of working closely with local artists by giving them space to mount their exhibitions which they’ve discovered not only beautify their walls, gardens and corridors but also frequently expand their client base since the art transforms their eatery into a mini-art gallery.

A number of these corporates have also purchased African art work not only for its aesthetic value but also for its investment potential.

“One only had to look at the prices Kenyan artworks were fetching at Circle Art’s last (East African) art auction a few months back to recognise that appreciation for the art’s investment value is being widely recognised,” said Mr Shah.

“Personally, I can’t buy a work of art unless I love it and look forward to having it in my home,” he confessed.

“I can’t buy something just because I’ve been told such and such an artist’s prices are bound to shoot sky high. I have to buy what I personally like, but that is my personal preference,” he said.

Nonetheless, his wife Leena Shah, an artist in her own right, told me their home is filled with Kenyan art. “It’s almost like an art museum since we both enjoy Kenyan art,” she added.

One of the local judges, Carol Lees, the founder and curator of One Off Gallery, said that even if the six didn’t win in the top ten this year, Kenyan artists now knowing the Barclays Atelier competition is an annual event, is bound to serve as a catalyst to inspire them to create even more exciting artwork.

In fact, apart from the exposure the artists and their art will receive through Atelier, the top prize includes a cash award of Sh1.2 million to be dispersed during a six month all-expenses paid sabbatical (equivalent to an art residency) at the Cite Internationale des Arts in Paris.

Upon their return they get a solo show at the Absa Gallery.  The top ten artists will all receive cash prizes as well as a two-day art professionalism course and a year’s worth of mentoring to foster their personal, professional and artistic growth.

Artists turn the country into an exhibition zone                                                                                      

Ivy Achieng with a painting instructor at National Museums of Kenya. PHOTO | ANTHONY OMUYA 

By MARGARETTA WA GACHERU

Posted  Tuesday, December 23  2014 at  16:08

In Summary

• There were consistent exhibitions underway all year long at local galleries, like One Off, Banana Hill, Red Hill and the ‘new’ Nairobi Gallery where the Murumbi collection showed off everything from rare stamps, jewellery, costumes, crafts to out-of-print books from all over Africa.

Kenyan artists were incredibly inventive in 2014, turning the Capital city and other parts of the country into venues where the visual arts could be seen, not just by patrons and private investors but by the public at large.

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There were consistent exhibitions underway all year long at local galleries, like One Off, Banana Hill, Red Hill and the ‘new’ Nairobi Gallery where the Murumbi collection showed off everything from rare stamps, jewellery, costumes, crafts to out-of-print books from all over Africa.

The Nairobi Gallery operates under the auspices of the National Museums of Kenya, where the Creativity Gallery mounted exhibitions of art by mainly young Kenyan artists throughout the year.

One major exception to the youth rule was Creativity’s giving free reign to veteran Kenyan artist Yony Waite (co-founder of Gallery Watatu with the late Robin Anderson and David Hart), whose exquisite exhibition entitled Into the Trees is still up for all to see.

The Nairobi Museum also hosted two important expositions in 2014 by the Kenya Museum Society (KMS). One was of the amazingly diverse drawings and paintings by the late Joy Adamson. The other was the annual KMS Affordable Art exhibition featuring artwork by Kenyans that had to be sold for less than Sh100,000.

Meanwhile, exhibitions were also held at art centres like Kuona Trust, Paa ya Paa, GoDown and the Kenya Cultural Centre – which finally opened up an exhibition hall in the last year.

Foreign cultural centres like the Alliance Francaise, Goethe Institute, Italian Institute of Culture and the Heinrich Boell Foundation were also sites where paintings, posters, photography and sculptures were regularly on display. Heinrich Boell is especially notable as it served as the launching pad both in 2013 and this past year for the new Kenya Arts Diary, the annual calendar cum visual arts catalogue of works by both upcoming and veteran Kenyan artists.

Major shopping malls like the Village Market and Sarit Centre also became spaces to peruse amazing art exhibitions. Sarit deserves a special mention since it hosted the first ever Nairobi Art Fair that was organised by Kuona Trust with support from Textbook Centre.

Restaurants like Talisman, Que Pasa, Carnivore and Lord Errol also have become sought-after sites by artists keen for their works to be seen by the upmarket clientele that eat out at such luxurious settings.

And despite Le Rustique having moved up to Nanyuki from Nairobi where it was always filled with fresh, new Kenyan art, the restaurant continues attracting artists who want their works seen by potential art patrons.

In the same vein, high class hotels and private clubs like the Villa Rosa Kempinski in Nairobi, Diani Beach at the Coast and the Capital Club in Westlands had beautiful exhibitions this past year. The Kempinski’s most notable one was the East African Art Auction organised by Circle Art Agency in November.

In addition to all the above, visual art both by Kenyans and other East Africans could be seen in exceptional locations throughout the year. For instance, Kuona Trust held an artists’ residency and exhibition early last year at the Tafaria Castle near Nyahururu.

Both the Sondeka Festival and the Nairobi Craft Fair took over the Nairobi Race Course to display not just art, but also jewellery, crafts, hand-made furnishings and even original Kenyan fashion.

Several foreign embassies opened up the residences of their high commissions and ambassadors to mount exhibitions featuring mainly artworks by Kenyans. That was true of the Russians, Americans, British, Belgians and Mexicans, all of whose senior state representatives warmly welcomed local artists and friends into their homes.

There were exhibitions in people’s private gardens, backyards and private homes as art patrons hosted exclusive dinners so their friends could meet and eat with local artists. Occasionally, whole houses were reserved so that artworks could be shown.