MISKA MOHAMMED SPENDID YOUNG SUDANESE PAINTER

            MISKA’S MAGICAL REALISM PAINTS RIVER NILE IN NEW LIGHT

By Margaretta wa Gacheru

When Circle Art Gallery held its first Khartoum Contemporary exhibition back in 2017, Miska Mohmmed was not just the only woman whose are was in the show. She was also the youngest artist among them. But she wasn’t too young to make a deep impression on Circle audiences who responded well to her River Nile-inspired art.

Miska’s paintings has been exhibited by Circle Art several times since then, but not only in Nairobi. Circle Art’s founder and director Danda Jamoljmek has taken her work all the way to Lagos and in October she will take it to London for another Art Fair there. Danda has also included the 26 year old painter in two of the last Art Auctions East Africa.

Currently, Miska is here in Nairobi to attend her first solo exhibition at Circle Art which will run at the gallery until October 8^th. Speaking to BD Life, she explains how growing up close to the Nile has had a profound impression on her art. One can easily see it in her luminous paintings which are suffused with luscious colors, hues of deep blues and shadowy blacks as well as grassy spring greens.

She paints like an oceanic alchemist, blending colors into a magical mix that conjure up ‘forgotten places” which emerge out of the depths of Miska’s vivid imagination.

Miska admits her connection with the Nile runs deep. “When I’m at home, I climb up to my third-floor studio where I can see the Nile from my window. It always inspires me,” she says.

Mainly painting semi-abstract landscapes and seascapes in acrylics on canvas, Miska is meticulous about first sketching out her ideas in watercolor works which are equally elegant and rich in a similar palette.

Describing herself as a landscape artist, Miska says her art is not about specific people or places. “My art is more about my feelings and the energy that I pick up from the places where I am painting,” says the artist who loves painting in the open air.

Those feelings are best expressed in river scenes where her waters are either swirling or free flowing, choppy or tranquil. She occasionally accentuates the beauty of her water worlds with lotus or daisies, rather reminiscent of Claude Monet’s Water Lilies.

Miska even paints an entire ‘lost city’ underwater with as many byways and highways as one can almost see in her exceptional ‘Crowded Town’. This work is exceptional for several reasons. For one, it’s her only cityscapes in the show. It’s also the only one where she changes her palette radically with streets painted fire engine red. The glaring reds seem to register the emotional cacophony that Miska hears in her head, but which inspired her all the same to paint this busy city that also engaged her attention.

A graduate with a Bachelor of Fine Arts in 2016 from the Sudan University’s College of Fine and Applied Arts, Miska says she was blessed with parents who encouraged her to paint from a very early age. “They are not artists themselves but they love art and encouraged me to be creative,” she says.

That kind of family support meant that Miska started early to cultivate her artistic talents such that today, her art is already earning her significant figures. For instance, on the opening day of her exhibition, “The Magic of Forgotten Places” several of her large paintings were sold on the spot. Among those that sold was Tranquility for USD4,200 and The Lost City for USD2,900. So Kenyan parents need to understand their children can be successful as artists, not just lawyer, accountants, and doctors, when they are encouraged and inspired to express themselves.

Miska says she only knows one other female artist from Sudan. She says Kamala Shug is still alive and painting, and she has inspired Miska to continue advancing with her art. Miska hopes she can also inspire other young women artists by her example.

 

 

COVID QUILT REVEALS SUFFERING OF LOCKEDOWN KENYANS

                    COVID QUILT REVEALS HARDSHIPS ENDURED DURING LOCKDOWN

BY Margaretta wa Gacheru

The COVID quilt is a work of art, It’s also the collective creation of more than 14 Kenyan women from self-help groups who, among other things, do embroidery as both an advocacy and an income-generating exercise.

In this case, the quilt is meant to send a message which is for Kenyans to be safe by getting vaccinated. At least that was the idea that the founder of The Advocacy Project, Ian Guest, had hoped the quilt would convey when he suggested the women embroiders create artistic images of the trials they have faced during the COVID pandemic.

“The quilt will circulate around schools, churches, community groups, wherever there’s discussion about the value of vaccinating people to protect them from the virus,” says Gillian Rebelo who is the liaison between Mr Guest who is based in Washington DC and the women based in informal settlements in both Kangemi and Kibera.

                        Gill Rebelo, Stella Makena and Karen Mbayaki with the COVID QUILT

“I wasn’t sure what Gill was asking us to do when we first met,” says Karen Mbayaki, leader of the Kangemi Advocacy Self Help Group. “She was offering to teach us skills in embroidery but many of us already knew how to embroider. But when she explained we would receive a stipend every time we met, that was an incentive for women to join in,” she adds.

Stella Makena leads a group of 11 women from Kibera who have also helped created the COVID quilt. “We have a lot of self-help projects, but this one has been special. We brainstormed ideas together before we created the images that we embroidered,” she says.

The COVID Quilt is not the first one that Kenyan women have produced in response to suggestions from the Advocacy Project, a non-profit group that works specifically with vulnerable communities in informal settlements all over the world.

“Ian [Guest] contacted me in 2019 since I was chairperson of the Quilt Group of Kenya at the time,” says Gill. “He told me a UNFPA conference was coming up soon in Nairobi and as his project works a lot with embroiderers and quilters, he wanted me to find women who could help create a quilt for the conference.” She adds.

Undaunted by the fact that she only had eight weeks till the conference, Gill set out to first find and train the women, then get their ideas about what would go onto the quilt, and finally produce it in time for the conference. Having taught quilting and embroidery for many years, Gill asked her Kenyan quilters to reach out on her behalf. That’s how she met Karen and Stella and got the groups brainstorming about problems that women face.

“Skills training was primarily done by Christine …, a professional quilter,” says Gill who marveled that the Women’s Quilt was completed in time, and is now on its way to be permanently hung in the United Nations in New York.

The women embroiderers continued to meet, with a small stipend from Advocacy. It was Guest who suggested they pursue their next big project in light of COVID-19 and the Kenyan public’s hesitancy to take the vaccine.

“We once again brainstormed on the problems Kenyan families have faced since the lockdown began,” says Stella who did all the outlining of ideas on fabric squares that the Kibera women embroidered in. Karen’s women also brainstormed with Edwin… outlining their ideas on fabrics they would embroider thereafter.

The result was the COVID Quilt containing 14 images depicting the genuine plight that Kenyans have suffered since COVID came to Kenya. The images portray everything from children taking their classes under a tree to homes being congested places where no one has work, no funds are coming in, and children are stuck inside with no books or internet.

The images also reflect the way public transport services have taken advantage of the lockdown. Their fares have gone up while the number of buses circulating has gone down. Then there are images of everything from a daughter mourning her dad, a wedding filled with all empty chairs, and an airplane leaving people stranded since all flights were cancelled. Then there’s the beggar who is bypassed by everyone who is nearly in the same situation, the cop pushing people around, and the healthcare worker trying to save lives.

In short the Quilt is a masterpiece portraying Kenyan people’s actual suffering during this pandemic which has yet to go away.

“The hope is the quilt will send the message to Kenyans that the vaccine can help to bring the pandemic to an end, so get vaccinated,” Gill adds.

 

 

 

WHY TITLE OBNOXIOUS OBVIOUSLY?

OBVIOUSLY OBNOXIOUS

By Margaretta wa Gacheru

The first sign that we might have trouble watching Igiza Arts Production of ‘Obnoxious Obvious’ at the Kenya Cultural Centre last weekend came at exactly 3pm, right when the show was scheduled to begin.

That is when we watched one of the set designers stick ‘presidential’ photos on the wall, as if that shouldn’t have been done at least an hour .earlier

After that, there was the mulling around of production people as some checked out the lighting and others did who knows what. We wondered why all of these last-minute details hadn’t been arranged in advance? Was this a sign that no one was in charge or just that the cast and crew kept the so-called ‘Kenya time’, meaning arriving at least half an hour late?

Either way, the show finally opened with the National Anthem after 3:40pm and the show that Wreiner Arnold Mandu scripted, directed, and produced finally took off. Mr. Mandu founded Igiza Arts, so we may have to hold him to account for his not running a tighter ship.

His story was a good one. It showed us several slices of Kenyan everyday life, starting with the most impoverished, shifting to an aspiring middle class, and revealing the dirty linen of the rich, powerful, and corrupt.

Kibali (Shammah Nyagaka) and his parents (Odhiambo Obonyo and Faith Andati) were living at the bottom rung of society. Their home was about to be taken since they had no means to pay off the loans they had borrowed. And their title deed had been the collateral Kibali’s father, Biledi (Odhiambo Obonyo) had used to secure those loans.

Poverty was the bane of their existence. But one ray of hope came when Kibali was offered a job as a bartender at an upmarket hotel. 

He went straight there, and immediately, his family’s lives were transformed. Biledi was even planning to take out yet another loan. But that was not to be since COVID had come to Kenya, and life would never be the same.

After several slow-going set changes, we finally met the Head of State, Okuzo (Darwin Wanjiru) who was the embodiment of corrupted power. He has a lovely wife, Oluyele (Milka Wangui) who on the one hand enjoys the privileges she has as First Lady, but on the other, finds his unethical plans to exploit the COVID pandemic for his personal gain abhorrent.

Oluyele challenges Okuzo, but rather than wrangle with her, he takes his daughter Erima (Lisa Odhiambo) with him to his public engagements to show her how to steal while looking like a saint.

The pivotal moment of the play comes when Okuzo responds to the COVID crisis. He is thrilled that COVID 19 has finally arrived in Kenya so he can inflate the numbers and on paper, look justified when asking for heaps of donor money for masks and other coverings that especially the hospital staff working with COVID patients need to stay safe from the corona virus.

Okuzo had been successful in training up his child to be just like him. Erima is greedy, selfish, and oblivious to the needs of her fellow Kenyans. She finds a billion shillings in her bank account, obviously from her father meant to be used to relieve Kenyans from the pain of catching COVID. But she could care less.

Erima’s boyfriend had been the hotel manager that was kind to Kibali when he started out on the job. But once she got her billion, and coincidentally, he lost his job due to the lockdown, she dumped him and went off with the Hotel’s manager.

The manager’s simultaneous loss of both his job and his girlfriend led to his doing something drastic. It was a stark statement, but the reality of Kenyans committing suicide is a sad reality.

Okuzo’s arbitrary style of extending the lockdown and the early curfew, also has consequences that reveal the high=handed cruelty of an autocratic ruler. It leads to Kibali’s getting picked up and roughed up by local cops for being out a few minutes after curfew. That’s the last we hear of him.

But Okuzo is not left unscathed. His darling daughter Erima suddenly gets ill and just as fast, falls over and is gone just like that.

Mandu’s story closely mirrors much of what we sadly know about Kenyan society today. He doesn’t shy away from truth-telling. But he must tighten up his production, making swifter set changes so the story flows.

 

 

KCAU'S SIMBA BAZENGA RADICALLY URBANIZED THE LION KING

 LION KING RADICALLY REVISED IN SPARKLING SHENG

By Margaretta wa Gacheru

On a scale of one to ten, the senior students from KCA University nearly scored a jackpot with their premiere performance of ‘Simba Bazenga: A Musical Play’ at Kenya National Theatre this past week.

They get high marks for everything from choreography, costuming, and sensitive acting to lighting, set design, and set changes which were swift and inconspicuous.

The only thing that dropped the bar a bit (but didn’t undercut my view that KCAU just produced the best musical theatre work of 2021, hands down) was that delicate mix of technology and live theatre.

“The software let us down,” says the show’s director, Ogutu Muraya who also lectures in KCAU’s Department of Arts, Film, Media, and Economic Studies. “It’s the reason we were a half hour late in starting,” he adds. Yet he didn’t need to explain the delay since school students were still streaming into KNT during those moments in any case.

It was Muraya’s choice to risk a glitch just so his students could a taste of current theatrical trends which definitely include mixing live performance with digital technology. But by creating theatrical backdrops with beautiful images projected from a computer, the outcome was bound to be dicey. It mostly worked well (apart from a couple of brief glitches) at the Friday matinee, creating moods most relevant to the tale that turned out to be a radical, indigenized adaptation of Disney’s The Lion King, workshopped and scripted by Silas Temba.

“We’d prefer to say the show was inspired by The Lion King, but you could see the many differences,” Muraya told Weekender when we met after the show. In fact, Simba Bazenga was a brilliant modification of the original tale, starting with replacing English with Sheng and Swahili.

The show is still about family, identity, and responsibility. It’s also about power, betrayal, jealousy, and justice. But the fact that it’s set in urban Nairobi, not on some idyllic African savannah, makes the whole story come alive with urban sights and sounds.

Musically, the show is again a mix of many of the Lion King classics like The Circle of Life. But the score was also revised and indigenized by Rodgers Ng’inja who picked up another classic, ‘Hakuna Matata’ only to transform it into a reggae romp. The song has different connotations now. It marks the moment when the young prince Simba, (played charmingly by Sandra Chadota) stops grieving and feeling guilty about his father’s death. He essentially turns his back on his destiny and identity, and takes a mindless, ‘don’t care’ attitude towards his life.

That’s exactly what his uncle Scar (Emmanuel Barasa) wanted him to do. Having been instrumental in his brother’s death, uncle then went on to convince Simba he was responsible for his father’s demise, and had better flee for his life, which he does.

That left the field open for Scar to claim he is now heir to the throne. Jealousy had enflamed his cruel scheme to dethrone his stately brother. It got him the title and time enough to bring devastation to the Pride Lands and mourning to people who felt the double loss of both father and son.

Simba would have been lost in the wilderness forever if it hadn’t been for Rafiki (Kulola Kitatu) the female shaman, who serves as a sort of narrator. She stumbles upon Simba (now played by Mikal Otieno), reminds him of his role and responsibility to his people. She compels him to come home and reclaim what is rightfully his.

The only problem is that Simba has spent years living in shame, trying to crowd out the feeling he was responsible for the death of his dad. He comes home, only to be reckoned a coward by his best friend Nala (Sharon Chelang’at) who rejects the ‘don’t care’ man that he’d become.

It is her strong rejection that finally wakes him up to regain his courage of conviction and join the struggle to retrieve the Pride Lands and his place at the legitimate leader of his people.

Simba Bazenga was so professionally performed that one can hardly believe it was a final students’ assignment in Muraya’s theatre arts class. But it’s all the better for illustrating the calibre of theatre that university students can create when they are tutored well.

Ogutu Muraya may be better known as an internationally acclaimed storyteller than a theatre arts teacher. KCAU is fortunate in having him on staff, and clearly his students are as well.

 

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KESHO KUTWA:; TOWARDS A NATIONAL ART GALLERY

‘                    KESHO KUTWA’ APPEALS FOR A NATIONAL ART GALLERY SOON

                                                                                         Peterson Kamwathi

By Margaretta wa Gacheru (published September 24, 2021)

When Tony Wainaina speaks to friends of Kenya Museum Society tomorrow afternoon , one of Kenya’s top financial consultants won’t be focused so much on finances as on the future of Kenyan culture. As Chairman of the National Museum’s board of governors, he will be talking about the National Art Gallery and the need for Kenya to finally establish one of our own.

“It’s been [more than] a fifty journey since the need for a National Art Gallery was raised, but still it hasn’t happened,” says the man who is currently spearheading a struggle with the government that began as early as 1966 when Kenya’s second vice president Joseph Murumbi proposed such an institution in Parliament.

“I’ll be speaking about the rationale for having a national art gallery comparable to the National Gallery in London and the Smithsonian in Washington, DC,” says Wainaina. He might have referred to ones in Zimbabwe, South Africa, and Nigeria as well.

                                                                                                  Peter Ngugi

One point he says the government has yet to understand is that Kenya’s creative economy is growing fast. And while it may not yet be equivalent to that of the US, India or even Nigeria, the revenues fthe arts industries in all those countries are exceeding many of the traditional revenue spinners today. Just look at Hollywood, Nollywood, and Bollywood, all of which are reaping millions from the arts.

“If Kenyan politicians understood the economic value of the arts, they might stop pushing cultural concerns to the bottom of their budgetary priorities,” he adds.

But a man like Murumbi was equally concerned about the development of Kenya’s cultural identity. A National Art Gallery would serve as a repository for the arts. It would also play a central role in conserving some of Kenya’s finest artists’ works which now reside overseas, everywhere from Russia, Italy, and the British Museum to multiple museums in US and Europe.

Dennis Muraguri

The five artists selected to be in the exhibition are five of Tony’s favorites. They include Peterson Kamwathi, Peter Ngugi, Dennis Muraguri, Beatrice Wanjiku, and Michael Wafula. All are busy professional artists, meaning they are working creatively on a fulltime basis and earning a good livelihood from their art in the process. In contrast to the stereotypic view that ‘all artists are impoverished’, and therefore discourage your child from becoming one, virtually all of them have been able to sell their work for many hundreds, if not a million shillings per piece of work that they produce.

All five are painters, yet Muraguri combines printmaking with painting. Meanwhile, Ngugi, Kamwathi, and Muraguri are also appreciated for their sculptures. So versatility is one of the qualities they all share. Nearly all of them have also been involved in mentoring up-and-coming artists. But ultimately, it’s the quality of the artwork and the statement it makes that has given the greatest appeal to their art.

Their work compliments a smaller show next door in the Creativity Gallery by John Kariuki and Jimmy Githeka. It also stands adjacent to another group exhibition, ‘Dream of a Renaissance’ which also supports the vision of a National Art Gallery.

                                                                                                 Beatrice Wanjiku

\Since the Sixties, the visual arts scene has grown by leaps and bounds, starting with Kenya’s first African-owned art gallery, Paa ya Paa in 1965. Other commercial galleries also have been active since the Sixties, including Gallery Watatu, Studio 68, and the New Stanley Art Gallery. Foreign cultural institutions have also played a role in promoting Kenyan visual culture, starting with Goethe Institute in early Sixties followed by the French, British, Italian, and American. Yet none of them could fulfill the role of a National Art Gallery.

According to artists like Etale Sukuro and Murumbi himself, the dream of a National Art Gallery nearly happened when the Kenya government bought the building that is now the National Archive in the late 70s. At the time, it was bought specifically to establish the national art gallery. But by mysterious means, the plan was waylaid at the last minute, and artists’ hopes were dashed yet again.

Today, the National Museum just opened a visual art exhibition entitled ‘Kesho Kutwa’ and co-curated by Wainaina with the Nairobi National Museum curator Lydia Galava. “We called the show ‘kutwa’ [day after tomorrow] because the artists, like everyone else, has had to cope with COVID and the challenges associated with it. So the changes we want to see won’t happen tomorrow. But we are hopeful for the day after,” he adds.

                                                                                          Dennis Muraguri

The five artists selected to be in the exhibition are five of Tony’s favorites. They include Peterson Kamwathi, Peter Ngugi, Dennis Muraguri, Beatrice Wanjiku, and Michael Wafula. All are busy professional artists, meaning they are working creatively on a fulltime basis and earning a good livelihood from their art in the process. In contrast to the stereotypic view that ‘all artists are impoverished’, and therefore discourage your child from becoming one, virtually all of them have been able to sell their work for many hundreds, if not a million shillings per piece of work that they produce.

All five are painters, yet Muraguri combines printmaking with painting. Meanwhile, Ngugi, Kamwathi, and Muraguri are also appreciated for their sculptures. So versatility is one of the qualities they all share. Nearly all of them have also been involved in mentoring up-and-coming artists. But ultimately, it’s the quality of the artwork and the statement it makes that has given the greatest appeal to their art.

Their work compliments a smaller show next door in the Creativity Gallery by John Kariuki and Jimmy Githeka. It also stands adjacent to another group exhibition, ‘Dream of a Renaissance’ which also supports the vision of a National Art Gallery.

 

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BRUSH TU ARTISTS USE CREATIVITY TO COPE WITH LIFE

 USING CREATIVITY AS AN EFFECTIVE COPING MECHANISM

                                                                    By Michael Musyoka

Using creativity as an effective coping mechanism - Business Daily (businessdailyafrica.com)

By Margaretta wa Gacheru

Brush tu artists were thinking about ‘Coping Mechanisms’ even before the corona virus hit Kenya and the country got shutdown. And long before their exhibition opened at Alliance Francaise earlier this month.

“Long before COVID, we had been talking about having an exhibition around that theme since there are so many issues that we artists are struggling with. But then we never got around to it until now,” says Michael Musyoka, one of Brush tu Artists Collective’s founder members.

                                                                  Bushkimani Moira
 

Musyoka is also one of nine members of the group whose artworks are on display at Alliance Francaise in a show entitled ‘Coping Mechanisms.’ The other eight are Abdul Kiprop, Boniface Maina, another founder member, Bushkimani Moira, Emmaus Kimani, Kimani Ngaru, Lincoln Mwangi, Peteros Ndunde, and Sebawali Sio.

Each one of the nine has found the ir own creative means of coping with difficulties, be they COVID-related or otherwise. Most of them are hanging from the AF walls either as paintings (by Musyoka, Sebawali, Lincoln and Bushkimani), or drawings Peteros, or photography by Emmaus Kimani or prints by Abdul. But there are also several sculptures shaped by Kimani Ngaru, Brush tu’s first professional sculptor to join the group.

There are several installations in the show as well. Emmaus created a series of video and audio installations while he was an artist-in-residence in Germany. “I was in Berlin when COVID hit and I couldn’t come back. So my way of coping was trying to find ways to capture the serenity I felt while I was there. It’s what led to my creating the videos and audios that became installation in the show,” he says.

The other installation is by Bushkimani whose scrap-metal collage entitled ‘The Scientist, the Politician, and their Mouthpiece: If you can’t beat them, run!’ is an intriguing work unto itself. Yet what makes it an installation is the bird’s cage hanging a few feet away from it where several caged birds seem spellbound, watching the scrap-metal ‘TV screen’. “We are like the birds who look like they are caged, but they don’t realize there are holes in the cage sufficient for them to easily fly out if they wished. So their entrapment is an illusion,” she adds. ‘The point is they all had a choice!”

Asked by DN Life and Style how the installation reflects her own means of coping, she says she has become more of an active observer of social affairs, rather than being depressed by the current state of things.

                                                                                             Boniface Maina

Peteros Ndunde says he feels similarly in that his means of coping is facing whatever troubles come his way, and facing them head on. His sinuous drawings of dynamic men in motion reflect that same sort of resilience. They seem to get more agile, refined, and aligned with a delicate balance that keeps them in motion and also able to avoid being overwhelmed by the issues that might come along.

Boniface Maina says he put several of his earlier works in the exhibition since they say more about a time when he was struggling to cope with internal issues. “Previously, my art had been more political but I wanted to shift into a more self-reflective mode. I wasn’t quite sure how to do that,” he adds. That discomfort over his felt need to make the transition from the familiar to the unknown is reflected in his works in the exhibition. In fact, the pieces reflect his already having made the move artistically though he may not have realized it at the time.

Lincoln Mwangi also displays several paintings that are from an earlier time. But they equally reflect his means of coping with the challenges of the day. He spent much of the lockdown preparing artworks to include in his recent solo exhibition at GravitArt.    

The same is true for Sebawali who is currently having a solo exhibition at Lisa Christophersen’s new venue, LifeStyle. Seba like Lincoln had found the most effective means of coping with these uncertain times is to work at what she most loves doing, and that is to create.

Finally, the paintings in ‘Coping Mechanisms’ that I found disturbing are by Musyoka. Noting that the title of the exhibition had been intentionally open-ended, meaning everyone might have a different challenge to cope with, Musyoka says he was taking a deeper look at the issue of death, since for him, it is inevitable. “It was coming to terms with its inevitability that I had to cope with,” he says. It is also what inspired the art he produced for Coping Mechanisms. It’s not my favorite, but it’s perhaps the most provocative in the exhibition.

 

 

 NEW ARTS ACADEMY THE FIRST OF ITS KIND IN KENYA

By Margaretta wa Gacheru (published 17 September 2021)

 Nimo Mathenge left Kenya more than two decades ago with big dreams and high hopes, many of which she managed to fulfill over those next twenty years.

And in the last two years since she’s been back, Nimo has confirmed she’s no less ambitious about her latest set of dreams becoming realities here at home. That includes starting a school specifically dedicated to training Kenyan youth in the arts.

“I’ve always been interested in education and the arts,” says the Moi Nairobi Girls graduate and Daystar University alumni who now runs ZanArtts academy of the arts.

   

                                                                                                                                                                Nimo Mathenge, founder of ZanArtts academy of arts                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                  And even when she took off for the filmmakers’ mecca, Hollywood, where she ended up co-producing documentaries, film shorts, and full-length features for everyone from Disney studios to Oprah’s station OWN, Nimo still stayed grounded in education. “I’d find time to teach kids from low-income areas of LA about creativity,” she tells Weekender.

Even when she got a job teaching film at the acclaimed Orange Country School of the Arts, Nimo still taught slum kids whenever she could.

“It’s so important that children learn to appreciate the arts,” says Nimo who felt she had a ‘divine calling’ to start the school, even though she knew it’d be an uphill battle among most Kenyan parents who still believe their children’s best interests are served if they study business and accounts or law or medicine; rather than dance, voice or acting or the visual arts.

                     Quentin Earl Darrlington with his students during finale of Broadway Nairobi

Yet parental biases haven’t deterred Nimo. Instead, she takes the Orange County school as a worthy case in point for figuring out Arts Education could work in Kenya. She also went and got a master’s degree in teaching at Harvard as further evidence she is ready to sustain the school.

“Parents need not think ZannArts neglects the academic aspects of children’s education,” she adds, noting that all the school’s morning classes are devoted to either math, science, language, history, geography, or CRE. “Then our afternoons are dedicated to arts subjects,” says Nimo who works closely with both home schooling experts and leaders at the Steiner School where creativity is a critical component of the school’s curriculum.

In any case, ZannArts’ first semester of classes which ran from January to June 2021 went well, she says. But what was also exciting is that Nimo ran a series of shorter summer classes, several of which were led by the group, Broadway Dreams from New York.

Founded by Annette Tanner, who’s got similar interests to Nimo’s in education and the arts, Tanner brought two tremendously talented Broadway stars to teach young Kenyans. Quinten Earl Darrington and Noah Ricketts only taught at ZannArts for two weeks. But that was enough to make their performances late last month at Movenpick Hotel a monumental success.

Together, Noah and ‘Q’ worked closely mainly with youth groups coming from Kibera. ‘They worked with S’Cools Sounds, a young people’s band run by Jacob Saya, the dance company, Cheza Cheza, and several youth groups that work closely with another American group, Crossing Thresholds.

At the centre of the whole program is ZannArts and Nimo Mathenge who also got serious backup sounds from Levy Wataka and his National Youth Orchestra.

Yet it wasn’t Nimo who had the highest praise for the young talents who performed recently at Movenpick Hotel. It was Annette Tanner who, during the closing of ZannArts finale showcase who gave the most credible justification for why every parent with an artistically inclined child ought to attend ZannArts Academy of the Arts.

“We travel all over the world and meet young people committed to the arts. But I’m not sure we’ve ever seen children with so much enthusiasm, energy, talent, and willingness to try out new things,” she said.

In fact, there was little doubt that Kenyan youth loved working with Noah and Q as well as their fellow Kenyan musicians, acrobats, dancers, and actors. By program’s end the two Broadway stars had sung (and taught) everything from Michael Jackson’s Man in the Middle, and The Lion King’s Circle of Life, to Stevie Wonder’s ‘Signed, Sealed, and Delivered’ and Eric Wainaina’s ‘Diama’. And as they sang, they looked like ‘The Pied Pipper of Hamelin’ followed by scores of school children who would clearly love to attend a school like ZannArts if that was a possibility.

 

CORNUCOPIA OF CREATIVITY THIS SEPTEMBER

            CORNUCOPIA OF CREATIVE EXPRESSION ACROSS NAIROBI

                               Dennis Muraguri's Matatu at Kesho Kutwa at Nairobi National Museum                       

By Margaretta wa Gacheru (published September 17,2021)

September has got my head spinning as there is so much going on.

One could chalk it up to COVID protocols which all the art centres take seriously. But the surge of showcasing art is not just filling the galleries and museums. It’s also occupying bookshops, country clubs, foreign cultural centres and new boutique cafes.

The abundance of Kenyan artistic expression has even registered internationally. It’s elicited comments recently from BBC, Financial Times; and just last week, Kenyan artists were featured on German Television.

                                                       Gakunju Kaigwa's wood root mirror frame at Noir Gallery

The reason Nairobi especially is getting noticed is because of what’s happening right here and now. Part of it could be that the Kenya Government has finally aligned itself with artists committed to building a National Art Gallery.

To advance that effort the Nairobi Museums and Ministry of Culture launched an exhibition last Friday night entitled ‘Kesho Kutua’ and featuring five of Kenya’s most globally acclaimed artists. They include Peterson Kamwathi, Beatrice Wanjiku, Michael Wafula, Dennis Muraguri, and Peter Ngugi.

                                  Peterson Kamwathi's precarious positions at Kesho Kutwa

It’s a lovely exhibition, but it overlaps with two other shows that are underway. One is in NNM’S Creativity Gallery where John Kariuki and Jimmy Githeka both explore aspects of Nairobi life, only together theirs has a chiaroscuro effect, with Kariuki’s art filled with bright blue equatorial light while Githeka paints beneath the shadows of night. Then next door, the Uber Hall features both ‘Kesho Kutua’ at one end and the Ministry’s other-supported showcase of works. It includes newcomers, elders like Zarina Patel and Kibacha Gatu, and mid-lifers like Etale Sukuru and Ndekere Mwaura, the KU art lecturer who helped coordinate the whole symposium and show. So here is more proof that Kenya needs a National Art Gallery, just as former Vice President, Joseph Murumbi had insisted back in 1966.

                                 Beatrice Wanjiku's art at Red Hill Gallery, also in Kesho Kutwa and at One Off Gallery

Further evidence of the vitality of Nairobi’s visual art scene is that all the galleries are filled with exciting exhibitions. It starts with Banana Hill Gallery where a new exhibition opens tomorrow featuring KU lecturer Anne Mwiti, Kenyan-Jamaican Mazola wa Mwashighadi, and Nigerian painter Adesina Ademola. Then, at One Off, both of their major galleries are filled with new works by either Beatrice Wanjiku or Anthony Okello.

And at Circle Art, another brand-new solo exhibition opened night before last. It’s entitled ‘Magic of Forgotten Places’ and features works by the young Sudanese artist, Miska Mohmmed whose paintings will be at Circle Art through 28^th September.

Meanwhile, at Red Hill Gallery, Hellmuth Musch-Rossler is pulling out all the stops to showcase some of the best of his vast collection of original works by mainly leading contemporary Kenyan artists. They include artists like Shabu Mwangi, Paul Onditi, Peterson Kamwathi, Beatrice Wanjiku and Michael Musyoka among others.

                                                      Bushkimani Moira at Alliance Francaise

Then there are artists like Evans Ngure, Nikita Fazel, Milena Weichelt, and Usha Harish who chose to make the new Bookworm Library (which already blends books with a ‘Pot Pourri’ of  Eastern fashions) their art venue of choice. It’s at the Gigiri Craft Centre just next to the UN. Artists are there with imaginative sculptures, paintings, and photography.

And there’s a new boutique café and gallery called Noir (off Waiyaki Way) exhibiting an array of Kenyan artists, most especially Gakunju Kaigwa whose sculptures often combine beauty and functionality.

What’s fascinating is that even country clubs like the one in Karen have become venues where Kenyans are the main buyers of local artists’ works. That includes works by artists like Kamau Kariuki, Coster Ojwang, Simon Muriithi and many others all curated by Tom Siambey.

Finally, it was at Alliance Francaise that I found new works by all but two of the members the Brush tu Artists Collective. Sadly we missed one of the three ounder members, David Thuku who started off with Maina Boniface and Michael Musyoka. But both Thuku and the other absentee member, Elias Mung’ora are alive and working elsewhere. (Mung’ora just had a show in New York with Montague Contemporary.) Meanwhile, Boni and Musyoka (the other Brush tu cofounders) are two of Kenya’s most dynamic, imaginative, thoughtful, and expressive visual artists working actively right now. But they are not alone. If truth be told, Brush tu has attracted some of the most creatively curious young artists around. They include Abdul Kiprop, Peteros Ndunde, Lincoln Mwangi, Sebawali Sio, Bushkimani Moira, and Emmaus Kimani.

                                John Kariuki at the Creativity Gallery,Nairobi National Museum

In all, you can see Kenyan artists are seriously on the move, both locally and globally.

CAMILLE INVITES TOP ARTISTS TO TEACH RURAL YOUTH ART

CAMILLE BRINGS TOP ARTISTS TO LEWA TO TEACH RURAL YOUTH

                                                      Camille's mural at Lewa Conservancy 

By Margaretta wa Gacheru (published 10 September)

Since moving up to Nanyuki seven years ago, Camille Wekesa rarely comes to Nairobi. But one of Kenya’s leading landscape artists had news she needed to share that has been simmering up at the Lewa Conservancy for many months.

Camille is best known for being a fabulous muralist although the walls that she has transformed into exquisite works of art are mainly housed upcountry.

Six rooms, inclusive of walls, ceilings and floors are up at the Ol Jogi Wildlife Conservancy. These gems of Camille’s creativity are museum-quality work and deserve to be on display for the world to see.

Her more recent murals are up at the Lewa Conservancy where Camille has been running a series of weekend art workshops with teens from the territory and a consistent flow of leading Kenyan artists teaching the youth everything from the basics of painting and woodcut printing to photography and ceramics created out of local clays.

“The children come from two of the twenty schools that Lewa has built as gestures of good will towards the community,” says Camille who initially proposed the idea of conducting art education classes to the Lewa board who endorsed her idea readily.

                                                  Camille's other mural at Lewa Conservancy

“The conservancies have realized that the best way to work with local communities is by assisting them in solving their problems,” says Camille, who adds the schools Lewa constructed were in remote areas of the Valley where no secondary schools existed before.

“The Lewa Art Education program have 30 teens from Lokusero Secondary and 35 from Ntugi Secondary,” she adds. Admitting that she isn’t one of the art teachers herself, Camille prefers to coordinate the program since she has several projects of her own underway.

“Since the art education program began, we have invited two professional Kenyan artists to come at a time,” she explains. “I send a taxi to their homes so they arrive by midday on a Friday. Then they work with the youth a half-day, then a full day Saturday, and finally, another half-day on Sunday, before the taxi takes them home by early evening,” she adds.

Thus far, Camille has invited a rich variety of local artists who she stresses get a stipend for their artistic labor. “We don’t believe that artists are always meant to be donating their skills,” she says. Nor does she go along with the notion that artists are always meant to be poor.

Art education is something that Camille believes in strongly, and hopes that programs like hers will stimulate greater interest in the Government to revive an ‘examinable’ arts program in the national curriculum soon.

“I’m told that arts education has been partially restored to the school syllabus, but it is not examinable,” she says, recalling how fortunate she was to attend Kenyan schools that had arts programs. They prepared her well to go to Italian art colleges, first in Florence, then in Rome and Milan. “It was six years in total,” she says.

Among the artists who have given hands-on art classes at Lewa are a long list of local luminaries: Patrick Mukabi, Peterson Kamwathi, Kevin Oduor, Beatrice Wanjiku, MaryAnn Muthoni, Justus Kyalo, Tonney Mugo, Beatrice Wanjiku, King Dodge, Allan Githuka, Fitsum Behre and his wife Nicole, John Silver, Syowia Kyambi and her colleague Kibe, among others.

Meanwhile, Camille has a range of other projects she’s pursuing at her home outside Nanyuki. One is a new Primate Protection Program that she and her neighbors just started. “We have been re-planting trees so extensively that the wildlife has returned to the area. Thus, we wanted to find ways to work with people like the National Museums of Kenya to protect our revitalized habitat,” she says, having just come from a meeting with a NMK primate specialist before she met with BDLife.

The other project that Camille is involved with is painting a series of eight iconic landscapes in Kenya that are World Heritage sites. Her plan is to house each set of eight murals in a separate cottage as a form of documentation and possibly viewer attraction.

The eight sites that she will be painting are the Aberdares, Mount Kenya, Maasai Mara, Samburu, Tsavo, Tuurkana, the Great Rift Valley, and the Taita Kaya Mounds. None of this series will be for sale, she says.

         

                                                                      One of Camille's murals painted at Ol Jogi

“I will paint similar views in oils on canvas which can be exhibited and sold. But I am concerned with documenting the beauty of this country as we see it today, so the murals will remain intact.”

ORINO'S MEN OF AMBITION PART 1 NEEDED 2 & 3

                        MEN OF AMBITION PART 1 NEEDES PARTS 2 AND 3

                                                                The new Radini Dynasty

By Margaretta wa Gacheru (published 3 September 2021)

‘From the Journal of Orina’s production of ‘Men of Ambition Part 1’, staged last weekend at Kenya Cultural Centre, had a lot going for it.  It had some powerful acting, provocative dialogue, and thematic issues of power, greed, and murder which tend to attract a crowd curious to find out ‘whodunit?’ And how.

The production also didn’t make the mistake that many companies do at KCC, which is to mess around with colors in their lighting of the stage. We’ve seen shows that use red lighting to signal scenes of either passion or murder or both. We’ve seen green lights meant to indicate emotions like envy and greed. And when something sinister is about to happen, the lights can go down low so you can barely see the actors. There is always a spotlight to rely on, but often the spot lands out of place.

In every one of these cases, the lighting is not just a distraction. It renders all photographs taken during a show useless and unacceptable for publication or other professional use.

The ‘Men of Ambition’ lights-man/woman didn’t resort to red, green or black lights.But they did have a fixation for blue lighting, which fortunately wasn’t used throughout the show, but enough to make me wish colored lighting would be reconsidered for use by the stage director.

The big problem with Men of Ambition Part 1 was not so much the plot, acting, or directing of the five-person cast. The big issue is the playwright Orina’s planning to script a three-part play, but only present us with Part 1 last weekend. How come? Perhaps he hasn’t scripted Parts 2 and 3. But then he might have been wiser to wait until his three-act play was complete instead of leaving his audience mystified at the end of Part 1.

The mystification was evident when nobody applauded at Part 1’s end. It required the director-playwright to come out and confess, the show was over. One could hear grumbles that the show was too short, which it was. But there were other problems related to leaving us with an inexplicable cliffhanger.

I don’t want to spoil audience enjoyment which will undoubtedly come once Orina completes all three parts, and stages ‘Men of Ambition’ as simply an intriguing three-act play. But the way Part 1 ended was incredulous and unbelievable.

The storyline centred round the Radiri ‘dynasty’ and the issue of succession. The founding father of the family had just died, but mourning was quickly ruled out by Duke (Odhiambo Gadwil), the second son who claimed that he should be next in line since the first-born son, Cliff (Orina Brian) was weak despite their father having decided he should be his successor. The adopted daughter Vanessa (Brenda Kinya) also aspired to be head, although her intentions were much less clear since she was mainly fielding verbal abuses from her step-brother Duke.

The matriarch of the Radiri home, (Mary Kamantha) also felt her role deserved to be reckoned with, and the executor of the old man’s will, Esquire (Clinton Mwiti) was also on hand, apparently because he was both the father’s and the company’s barrister.

Quibbling among themselves ended as Cliff took charge to offer a toast to the new family arrangement. Unfortunately, someone had poisoned the wine that only Cliff drank. Now the scene cleverly switched into a murder mystery. Who would have wanted Cliff dead? Duke’s flamboyant style of having tried to grab his brother’s seat effectively set him up to be Suspect Number one.

Duke was right to protest that he was being set up. But no matter. While the stage got turned into a kind of family court, with Esquire serving as the presiding judge, Duke challenged all three critics, exposing the flaws of his mother, step-sister, and even the barrister. Nonetheless, the three ganged up on him. Thus, he was ‘charged’ and convicted for his brother’s murder, disowned from the family, and banished for good.

As soon as he left, something peculiar happened. The three were clearly co-conspirators, but the master mind behind what we had just watched turned out to be none other than who? Vanessa? Then, boom, Part 1 ends.

One assumes that the characters’ motivations will be clarified in Parts 2 and 3. But without even subtle clues suggesting that Vanessa is the wily witch that she would seem to be, one has to insist that Orina present us with the whole play next time. It is only fair to his audience.

CONTRACT LOVE NEEDED ZIPPY TO HELP HER STUDENTS OUT

               KU STUDENTS SHOWCASE THEIR MENTOR’S MUSICAL PLAY

By Margaretta wa Gacheru

Contract Love, staged last weekend at Kenya Cultural Centre by Kenyatta University students, is a play by Dr. Zippy Okoth that is one-part musical, one-part messy love story, and one-part murder thriller.

It’s got an interesting storyline, mirroring the plight of many school-leavers, the problem is finding a job to put bread on the table. Leave alone getting a senior position or a hefty wage. Anita (Judy Nyakio) is prepared to take any sort of work. She’s had to postpone completing her law course, the times are that tough.

Her sweetheart Tom (Andy Joseph) finds her employment as house-help to his uncle, Chris (Samson Adino). As humiliating as the suggestion might be, she agrees to take the job.

As it turns out Chris, a rich business tycoon, has a terminal disease, and behaves like grumpy old man. But Anita’s prepared to put up with anything, so long as she gets paid. In the course of six months, Chris’s health improves dramatically. Meanwhile, his business partner Harry (Jeff Opondo Omondi) wants to swindle Chris out of company leadership. He enlists Tom and tries to get Anita involved too. But she and Chris have already pledged undying love. What’s more, she warns Chris about the company contract that Harry has drawn up. But before the contract gets contested, Harry panics and the rest is a bloody mess, apart from Anita’s reunion with her old beau Tom.

It’s a story with so many twists and turns that it could have been a gripping show. Director Peter Oroto had assembled a number of excellent actors. The problem was that they needed at least another week of rehearsals. In that time, Oroto could have gotten his vocalists singing on key. He had a range of excellent voices, but they needed to take the tuning of their vocal cords more seriously,

Also, during that extra rehearsal time, the scene changes could have gotten tighter so the action from scene to scene could flow without the long lapses of darkness or silence that we witnessed last Sunday afternoon.

For instance, when the narrator told us the show would begin: ‘3-2-1’ and boom! Nothing happened except that in the dark, we could hear feet shuffling, chairs banging, and we wondered: Is the noise meant to be part of the show? It’s not.

The opening scene is in a night club where there’s an open mic, and Tom sings Anita a love song. The amorous hug that follows is meant to convince us that theirs is true love. But then, once she goes to work for grumpy Chris, we don’t hear or see him again for six months.

It’s during that time, apparently that Tom has been quietly corrupted and caught stealing cash from his uncle. Apparently, only Harry knows about it and plans to use that knowledge to blackmail Tom into helping him convince Chris to sign a new contract which would leave his company shares to him.

Tom (like Anita) has legal skills, and Chris counts on him as his legal advisor. Chris paid Tom’s school fees all the way through law school, so Tom’s loyalty is being sorely tested. He agonizes not only because he lost Anita carelessly, but also because he doesn’t want to betray his uncle. Harry detects his ambivalence and beats him up badly to convince him his life is on the line.

Before the story ends, there are two fatal shootings. But that’s the much of a spoiler I will be. The two gunshots are swift, efficient, and quite final. But they make the ending too easy, and also incomplete.

For instance, we don’t know what happens to the contract that Chris did or did not sign. If signed, would it be binding? What sort of impact would it have on Anita and the others left behind?

There is so much about ‘Contract Love’ that is intriguing and endearing. For instance, the impact that Anita’s presence had on the health of that lonely unwell bachelor is impressive. It’s also touching that both Chris and Anita have great news to share just moments before catastrophe hits in the form of Harry’s murderous money grab.

But the fact that the show ends with one last shot and the pregnant heroine Anita rushing back into the arms of her gun-totting old boyfriend Tom is a bit too Hollywood Wild Western style for me.

One word of advice: never take opinions of media critics too seriously! It’s not worth it.