FLORENCE WANGUI MAKES WAVES IN KENYAN ART WORLD

FLO’S CHARCOAL DRAWINGS OF BIRDS WINS AWARDS & SHOW AT ONE OFF

BY Margaretta wa Gacheru

Two years ago Florence Wangui was an unknown. The recent Kenyatta University graduate was on her way to becoming a biochemist or a vet as far as family and friends were concerned since those were the fields she studied at uni.

“I love science,” said Wangui speaking at One Off Gallery where her one woman exhibition of charcoal drawings is up for the month.

“But I love art more,” continued the first born of her parents’ four, who took a leap of faith two years back and chose to pursue her passion and penchant for art over her talent as a physical scientist.

No one could have anticipated Wangui’s meteoric rise from obscurity in November 2011 to stellar status in Nairobi’s fast moving art world today. That’s largely because she says she never exposed her desire to draw, except at Buru Buru Girls Secondary where she’d help out her science teacher by drawing everything from human eyes to animals on the blackboard prior to his teaching a particular topic.

“Otherwise, i didn’t show anyone my sketch book until [late 2011 when] I met Patrick Mukabi and told him I wanted to become a great artist and I’d appreciate his help,” she confessed.

It’s hard to believe she could have kept her heart’s desire a secret all those years, since she first started drawing when her family still lived in Eastleigh and she’d draw everything from cartoon characters to action heroes like Bruce Lee and Sly “Rambo” Stallone. But apparently, nobody was paying attention.

Perhaps that is one reason her current exhibition is full of chicken. “I think they are beautiful, but they are often ignored. I wanted to show people that even creatures they see as ordinary are really very special,” said Wangui who’s had cocks and hens in her life since she was a child, and thus she’s seen how intelligent they actually are

Even when she was living in Dandora and Kayole, her mother kept a few hens around, which Wangui would observe and draw. “My mother was very strict and made us stay indoors while she went to work, so that’s when I had time to draw.“

Ironically, when she shared her sketch book with Mukabi (who she’d first seen on Citizen TV teaching art on the Know Zone), she had no animals, only people, in her book. But once she started studying with him at the GoDown in early 2012, he wanted her to select her own subjects to work on.

“And so I thought, why look outside myself when I’m meant to draw things that I know well. The hens immediately came to mind,” she said.

It’s that familiarity with her subject matter that makes her charcoal drawing so stunning. Each creature/bird seems to have a personality of her or his own, and it’s the vitality and individuality of each creature that can partially explain how she’s an artist who seemly came out of nowhere in late 2012 when she took part in her first group exhibition at the GoDown and by 2013 she was winning cash prizes, invitations to exhibit in public spaces like Le Rustique and the Nairobi National Museum and now she was recently invited to be exclusively represented by OneOff Gallery.  

MARY ANN BURRIS FULFILLS HER DREAM: BUILDING A 'PEACE PATH'@NAIROBI MUSEUM

A PEACE PATH FINALLY OPENS AT NAIROBI MUSEUM

By Margaretta wa Gacheru

Ever since the 2007-8 post election violence, Mary Ann Burris has dreamed of building a proper Peace shrine or sanctuary in Nairobi.

This past Tuesday afternoon, the former Program Officer at Ford Foundation in Nairobi saw her dream come true with the formal opening of ‘The Peace Path’ at the Nairobi National Museum.

It almost looks like an ordinary ultra-green grassy lawn but the carefully situated stones—some granite, other mica and soap stone in multiple colours, sizes and shapes—strongly suggest that something else is going on. The well-manicured ground has far greater significance for Ms Burris than it being a park situated just behind the Museum where passersby can relax.

“It’s a labyrinth,” she explains, noting that a labyrinth is a universal, ancient symbol-often a spiral- that’s been used for centuries in many different cultures for spiritual ceremonies that involve meditation or prayer and also healing.

It’s even been found at ancient African rock art sites, but Ms Burris first took an interest in labyrinths after finding one in France while attending a course at the Wisdom University in Chartres several years ago.

Having studied non-Western healing practices as a Chinese-studies graduate student at Stanford University in the States, and having a Cherokee grandmother who was a shaman healer, it’s no surprise to Burris believes the deeper, more psychological, invisible wounds suffered by Kenyans during those traumatic days still need to be addressed.

But her dream of doing something to affect healing didn’t happen until she met several Kenyan sculptors who helped her realize the best way forward.

But before the sculptors got involved she first had to get a green light from the Nairobi National Museum’s director general, Dr. Farah, to use that previously ‘neglected and unused’ piece of land to develop a peace shrine.

“We always establish an MOU with the Museum whenever we propose a project,” said the founder of TICAH, the Trust for Indigenous Culture and Health, who already had developed two other projects with Dr Farah before the Peace Path. One is a Plant Medicine Garden; the other is a Sculpture Garden made after she found four felled gum trees on the Museum Ground and called local artists David Mwaniki and Anthony Wanjau to create sculptures out of them.

She’d tried several times to get her labyrinth idea going because she had both seen and read about so many people who’d benefited by walking through labyrinths elsewhere in the world. But her efforts always came to naught, until she met Gerard Motondi, the award-winning sculptor who initially proposed they collect different kinds of stones from all over Kenya to construct the peace path.

“I liked that idea because the labyrinth is a symbol of unity and wholeness, so that the different stones could symbolise the different communities of Kenya working together to become the peace path,” she said.

But then, when Motondi introduced veteran sculptor Elkana Ong’esa to Ms Burris, she said everything quickly fell into place.

The two men, assisted by another outstanding stone sculptor Charles Kombo, were able to obtain tons of various stones from all over Kenya at very low costs.

It was they who implemented her idea and design, creating a spiral walkway that she said only takes right turns (“never left ones that lead to dead-ends which is what happens in mazes” she added).

Burris said she has already witnessed the healing effects of the Peace Path. It may be simply because someone has to slow down to actually walk the peace path. It may even be that the power of mental suggestion is operative since Burris is very clear the Peace Path is especially valuable as a site for prayer or meditation which she feels can definitely result in healing new and even old wounds.

One thing she has especially values along the path are the two sculptures donated by Ong’esa and Motondi, The Prophet and The Eagle, both of which are also universal symbols of peace and freedom.

“Some people thought I was crazy to pursue this project but we have had tremendous support from friends all over the world who, as I, want to see lasting peace come to Kenya,” she added.

Just before the launch of the Kenya Museum Society annual Art Fair last weekend, Kuona Trust opened an exhibition of David Mwaniki’s children’s toy entitled ’30 Years Ago’.

“Making toys out of old wires and scrap metals was what we did then, in contrast to today when plastic imports have flooded the market,” Mwaniki said. So his show is a three dimensional ode to nostalgia, and to the time when Kenyan artists first got a glimpse of what creativity and imagination could achieve, namely fun, freedom and the joy of self-expression.

FRANCIS MBUGUA INSPIRED SCORES OF NGECHA ARTISTS

FIRST GENERATION NGECHA ARTIST INSPIRED GENERATIONS TO COME

By Margaretta wa Gacheru

When a comprehensive history of contemporary Kenyan art is finally written, one man who must not be forgotten is Francis Mbugua.

Described as a ‘guiding force’ among younger generations of Ngecha village artists by Kitengela Glass artist Nani Croze who considered him a creative colleague, Mbugua, 71, died peacefully in his sleep last Wednesday, November 20^th.

Mbugua had worked with Croze since the mid-1980s when she and Dr. Eric Krystall began running annual art workshops, sponsored by the NGO, Family Planning Private Sector, to create paintings that carried the FPPS message.

A minimum of a dozen Kenyan-based artists including Mbugua, Jak Katarikawe, Charles Sekano, Etale Sukuro, and Wanyu Brush among others created powerful paintings that carried the family planning message and subsequently were used as monthly markers for FPPS calendars that went all over Kenya.

Croze also worked with Mbugua on numerous wall mural projects including his refurbishing all eleven murals at the United Nations Environment Program (UNEP).

One reason Croze loved working with Mbugua was because of his professionalism. “He was dedicated to doing quality work and he was consistent about getting a job done,” she said.

Croze was also happy to be collaborating with Kenyan artists, although she admits she’d lost track of Mbugua in the last few years.

She didn’t know, for instance, that one of Ngecha’s first visual artists was mugged and badly beaten a few years back and that his health deteriorated after that.

His demise follows closely on the heels of another so-called first generation contemporary Kenyan artist, Samwel Wanjau who actually started sculpting in the 1950s while Mbugua cited 1965 on his hand-written CV as the year he began painting. That was the year he had gone to live in Eastleigh with a family friend Edwin Githire.

According to Githire’s cousin, James Mbugua, Edwin is the one who introduced Francis to the visual arts, having himself been inspired by Congolese painters who had fled their country after the assassination of Patrice Lumumba and the coup d’etats led by General Mobutu Sese.

“Mbugua was also inspired by the Congolese artists who showed him how to paint using a palette knife and how to create works of art using banana fibre,” James added.

Francis and James were not blood brothers, but they got close once James came to Nairobi in 1967 to help market his cousin’s paintings. His skill as a hawker of visual art came in handy after the two Mbuguas moved out of Eastleigh and went to stay with Francis’ mother who had a City Council house in Jericho.

“It was there that both men began painting and making [banana] fibre art,” said Ngecha artist King Dodge Kangoroti who had heard the Mbuguas’ story so often that he knew it by heart.

“After they completed a set of [oil and fibre] paintings, the two used to take them everywhere from Paa ya Paa [when it was still on Koinange Street], Gallery Watatu, and African Heritage to estates like Kilileshwa and Muthaiga  where they would go door to door with their art,” Dodge recalled.

 “We were even arrested for trespassing in Timau and taken to stay 21 days in a Nanyuki jail as police thought we were cattle rustlers,” said Mbugua James who eventually went back to Ngecha where he had a small farm, leaving Francis to fend for himself.

It wasn’t any easier to be an artist in those days than it is today, especially as so-called self-taught Kenyan artists were hardly recognized.

But Mbugua went on to inspire many Ngecha artists to follow in his footsteps, including ones sometimes called ‘first generation’ Kenyan artists [like Sane Wadu and Wanyu Brush] who in fact, had come into the visual art world years after Mbugua began painting and also creating clay works comparable to those of Edward Njenga’s, the Eastleigh-based social worker who created ceramic figurines depicting the everyday lives of  poor people from Eastlands.

Mbugua exhibited in the 80s and 90s with Ruth Schaffner of Gallery Watatu. “But he worked with many other people,” said Kangoroti who is one of the younger generation of Ngecha artists who fell under the spell that Mbugua cast over a multitude of younger Ngecha artists.

Following the establishment of the RaMoMa Museum in 2000, Mbugua ran a number of workshops at Ngecha funded by either RaMoMa, Ford Foundation or Schaffner’s husband, the late Adama Diawara.

Mbugua’s influence was apparent late last week as the news of his demise spread like wildfire throughout Ngecha.

What he may best be remembered for was summarized by his old friend James who noted:

 “Mbugua loved art and up until he got sick, he could be found at home doing his painting every day and night.” 

GERALDINE'S GARDEN PARADISE

CULTIVATING A GARDEN PARADISE

By Margaretta wa Gacheru

Geraldine Robarts didn’t discover she had a green thumb until she went to teach fine art in Uganda at Makerere University in the 1960s. But the same year as she created her very first garden, she won an award from the Uganda Horticulture Society and she has been gardening ever since.

“I found that painting and gardening have a lot in common,’ she said. “They’re both about finding beauty in nature and about selecting colors that go together.’

Describing gardening as her passion, Geraldine (who is equally passionate about painting) never took a course in landscape gardening, but looking at her exquisitely eclectic gardens – she has several in her shamba in Karen – one could easily assume she had an advanced degree in horticulture.

“But I was an avid disciple of the late Peter Greensmith, [the British horticulturalist who was the first to come, work and stay in Kenya] from whom I got almost half of my plants and a great deal of my knowledge about them as well,” she added.

The rest of her plants have come from cuttings which she’s collected here and there and then carefully cultivates, using only natural fertilizers.

“Twice a year, we spread organic compost (mixed with soil) that we generate on a daily basis. We also spread dried horse manure [semi-annually] that we get from our neighbors up the road who have the biggest stable full of steeple jumpers in Kenya. That’s why our plants are so healthy,” she said, sounding like a proud mama whose offspring are strong, beautiful and blossoming.

Coming to Kenya to teach at Kenyatta University in 1972, Geraldine’s family soon decided to settle here and bought 17 acres of land in Karen when the space was still affordable.

“But with four children in school overseas, we had no choice but to sell most of that property,” said Geraldine who remained with almost three acres.

That is where she’s been creating lush, dense and colorful ‘gardens within gardens’ ever since. She’s got a spacious bamboo garden which also has a rich variety of other trees, flowers and shrubs in it – including everything from a Pride of Bolivia tree and a Yellow Candle tree to the Fichus Nitida tree (a relative of the Mugumu or Fig tree) which she planted more than 40 years ago!

She’s also got several rock gardens filled with assorted succulents, and an array of other gardens filled with orchids, ferns, cactus, chrysanthemums, bougainvillea, and all sorts of Latin named plants that I won’t enumerate. She’s even got lemon and papaya trees in the vegetable garden that’s maintained by her spouse Mike Fairhead, a former Group Technical Director with the Nation Media Group.

Having planted literally thousands of both indigenous and exotic flowers, trees, succulents and shrubs since she settled down on acreage that had once been part of Karen Blixen’s coffee plantation, Geraldine says she planted almost all the vegetation in her gardens – with some assistance in the physical bit of the process from her household staff – although she has one or two caveats.

“There were a half a dozen indigenous rainforest trees in the driveway when we arrived and they are still there. Also, there were three trees that had been planted by Karen Blixen which we found at the same time: two Jacarandas [which are now around 55 feet tall] and one huge Thorn Tree which was felled during a torrential storm some years ago.

“It was a tragedy since we loved that tree, but after we dug up all its roots, we found the hole was so deep, we had little choice but to put in a swimming pool, “said Geraldine who would’ve preferred not to have a big cement hole in her front yard, which is why she has potted plants, specifically ornamental Palms, all around the pool. “It’s to offset the hard effect of the cement,” she said.

Fortunately, she was able to salvage some seeds after the storm so that today she has two baby thorn trees which she tends lovingly as she does all the plants in her gardens.

Geraldine is continuously collecting cuttings and planting them all over her gardens. “If you look carefully, you can see how the plants are layered [in terms of color, shape, size and height] with a foreground, middle ground and background, in a way that’s similar to the way I paint,”

In fact, she is also continuously inspired to paint her gardens. And why wouldn’t she since she genuinely feels they have become a kind of paradise.

1ST KENYAN PHOTOGRAPHY AWARDS & EXHIBITION

PHOTOGRAPHY AWARDS showcase Kenyan talent and creativity

By Margaretta wa Gacheru

Winners of the first ever Kenya Photography Awards [competition] went on display at Alliance Francaise last Friday afternoon through December 21^st.

Sponsored by the Embassy of Switzerland together with a range of local and international corporations, the Kenyatta International Conference Centre generously hosted the award ceremony for free earlier this month when Kenya’s Chief Justice Willy Mutunga presented hefty awards to the winning photographers.

The overall winner was Thomas Mukoya of Reuters international news agency who earned KSh200,000 in that category. Mukoya also won KSh100,000 for winning first prize for his ‘Cricket Series’ in the Sports category and KSh25,000 more for winning a second prize (or honorable mention) in the Daily Life category. In all, the Kenyan earned KSh320,000 for his outstanding action images that captured amazing moments in the country’s daily life.

As there were seven categories that were judged, including News, Nature, Daily Life, Portraiture, Sports and Creativity as well as Most Promising Young Photographer, each first prize winner won KSh100,000; and like Mukoya the runners up were given Ksh25,000.

Organized by the year-old Photographers Association of Kenya (PAK) and PAWA254, the competition was open only to Kenyan entries, both established and up-and-coming photographers.

And in spite of the fact that the ‘annual’ competition was only launched this past September, more than 200 Kenyans responded sending in more than 1200 entries.

The cash prize offered a serious incentive for local photographers to submit their best images to the PAK-PAWA254 competition.

But their overwhelming response also reflected the fruits of PAK-PAWA254’s advertising campaign which, according to the competition’s co-founder, Njeri Mwangi, all took place online through Kenya’s vibrant social media, including Facebook, Twitter, the PAWA254’s website and emails to various art centers such as Kuona Trust, GoDown, iHub and members of the PAWA254 community.

The initial cut of the 1200 images was made by Boniface Mwangi, former Standard photographer, founder of PAWA254, award winning photojournalist, social activist and cofounder of the new award.

Mwangi was also the one who called up the other nine international and local judges who took over the rest of the adjudication process. All professional photographers with impressive credentials, they came from not just Kenya but Nigeria, Sudan, South Africa, UK, and the US. And most had either worked with international news agencies such as BBC, AFP and Associated Press or worked for international newspapers.

For instance, the chief judge was the Pulitzer-prize winning South African photographer Greg Marinovich whose images have appeared everywhere from Time and Newsweek magazines to New York Times, Washington Post, Wall Street Journal and The Guardian of London among others.

The other judges are also formidable, including Nigerian Babajide Adeniyi-Jones, Sudanese Emmanuel Jambo, Americans Emma Raynes and Ric Francis, Pan African Anna Umbima as well as Kenyans Sylvia Gichia, Carl de Souza and Omondi Abudho.

 Initially bringing Mwangi’s cut down to 30 short-listed photographers, the adjudicators ended up selecting first prize winners Georgina Goodwin in the news category, Thandiwe Muiru in Portraiture, Karim Kara for his nature images, Joe Kiragu in the creativity category, David Mutua for Daily Life and Thomas Mukoya for Sports.

The most promising young Kenyan photographer award went to both Thandiwe Muriu and Louis Nderi who had to split their KSh100,000 cash prize in two.

One needs to get to Alliance Francaise to see this extraordinary array of Kenyan creativity. One especially striking aspect of the winning images was the way several photographers submitted a series of images all related to one topic.

For instance, Mukoya’s winning sports award was for his Cricket series featuring Maasai players dressed to the teeth in their traditional and colorful regalia. Georgina Goodwin also won for her powerful Westgate series and despite Collins Kweyu not winning first prize for his Daily Life and News series, his Drug series of images revealed a side of urban African life that is as tragic as it is stunning and sensational.

Njeri Mwangi whose brain child is the Kenya Photography Awards is thrilled with the outcome of the ‘first edition’ of the Awards. “The idea was to encourage and stimulate Kenyan photographers as well as to expose their excellence – their skill, talent and creativity,” she said.

“There are so many companies and NGOs in Kenya who import photographers from abroad, not knowing how much local talent there is right here,” she added.

As manager of PAWA254, Njeri sees a multitude of talented visual artists coming to the art centre every week, which is one reason why she believed the competition would be a success.

But she and Boniface Mwangi are especially grateful to the Swiss Ambassador to Kenya Jacques Pitteloud who generously funded the winning prizes for this first edition of the Kenya Photography Awards.

Other sponsors included Epson, Cisco, pinkfoot, ComZtek, ICT Authority, Lightbox, KENYA Wine Agencies, Adobe, and Photomural Gigiri (k) Ltd as well as Alliance Francaise, Kuona Trust, KICC and of course, PAWA254.

Meanwhile, Dominique Thoemes’ art will be at the Talisman restaurant from December 5^th and Kwani? celebrated their final public anniversary party last Friday night with a one-day only exhibition of the art of Kenya’s most world renowned multimedia artist Wangeci Mutu.