WAJUKUU ARTISTS: FROM THE SLUM TO THE SUMMIT

ART BLOSSOMS IN INDUSTRIAL AREA SLUM

By Margaretta wa Gacheru (posted 12 February 2018)

Wajukuu Art Project got its name from the Swahili proverb, “Majuto ni mjukuu huja baadae”. It loosely translates: The grandchild suffers from the mistakes or regrets made by his forefathers.

“For instance, if a grandfather sells off the family land, he’ll leave his grandchildren poor and landless,” explains Josephat Kimathi, a long-standing member of Wajukuu Art who was introduced to the project as a child.

“I learned to paint when I joined Wajukuu’s Kids Art Club,” he says.

The kids club is still running on weekends and school holidays. Only now Kimathi (aka Kim) is one of the art teachers.

“The kids come from all over Mukuru [slum] and most of them are around six years old,” says Lazarus Tumbuti who’s been with Wajukuu since it started in 2004.

“We started it with Shabu [Mwangi] soon after we’d both finished training at MAC [Makuru Arts and Crafts],” says Lazarus who is one of several Wajukuu members who had the benefit of studying art at MAC, a two year art program started by an Irish Catholic nun, Sister Mary, in 2002.

Wajukuu was officially registered in 2007. But by then, not only the kids’ art club had taken off. Aspiring artists like Ngugi Waweru, Joseph (Weche) Waweru and Paul (Pablo) Njoroge had also joined. The project had equally inspired a number of more-established Kenyan artists to run training workshops at Kuona Trust and GoDown for Wajukuu’s emerging artists.

They included Peterson Kamwathi and John Silver, both of whom shared their skills in printmaking. The fruits of that training are clearly manifest in the prints that Wajukuu artists have tucked away upstairs in their Lunga Lunga Road studio.

“We don’t have a printing press per se,” says Ngugi. “Instead we make blocks [covered in plastic] and use them to press by hand.”

It looks like a long and laborious process. But what Wajukuu printmakers like Ngugi, Waweru, Lazarus, Pablo and Sammy Mutinda produce are impressive prints that will hopefully be on display in public quite soon.

The crew also paint, with their works most recently shown this past year at Kuona Trust and in Circle Art’s ‘Young Guns’ exhibition. Meanwhile, Shabu’s art continues to evolve while he’s in New Orleans attending an art residency.

But the best place to see the newest works by Wajukuu artists is at their upstairs studio. For instance, works included in Waweru’s ‘ant series’ are lovely, but they also conceal cryptic socio-political and personal commentaries on the realities of poor people’s lives.

In fact, nearly all the artists at Wajukuu were born and raised in Mukuru. “Most of us are sons of single mothers who couldn’t afford to send us to secondary. So we were fortunate to find ourselves learning to be artists,” says Lazarus who notes that MAC was free, and so is membership in Wajukuu.

“But when one of us sells a painting, he contributes ten percent to [the collective kitty],” Waweru says. “And if a [sold] artwork was made with materials provided by Wajukuu, the artist contributes 20 percent of his sales,” he adds.

Initially, Wajukuu was helped both with training and obtaining art materials from fellow artists like Patrick Mukabi, Kaafiri Kariuki, Anthony Wanjau, Mary Ogembo and Wambui Collymore.

ISK also collaborated with Wajukuu artists after art teacher Liza MacKay met Shabu. Parents from ISK even raised funds to help construct Wajukuu’s facilities.

Waweru adds their project has been assisted by many more generous supporters. But most notably, it was the Italian NGO, Movement for International Cooperation (MOCI) that also helped construct their double-decker centre.

“MOCI was impressed with our kids’ art program so they invited us to do art therapy with handicapped children at their vocational training centre in Makueni,” adds Ngugi.

They helped build a library in an adjacent building. “We also helped us buy land so we now own the art centre and library next door,” adds Waweru.

Wajukuu artists have exhibited in various art centres in Nairobi. But right now, the best place to see the rich treasure trove of Wajukuu artists’ work is at their Lunga Lunga studio.

You might need help finding the place, but the city block on which the studio resides is conspicuous for the colorful mabati and wooden wall murals painted on people’s makeshift shops. Plus there’s a huge Graffiti sign reading ‘Wajukuu’ painted outside the centre’s second story window.

‘Wajukuu really belongs to the whole neighborhood,” Ngugi concludes.

Shabu Mwangi’s life story on canvas and mabati

Thursday, June 5, 2014 

By MARGARETTA WA GACHERU |

"My dream" by painter Shabu Mwangi. His life story is well told through his paintings currently up at One Off Gallery (photo by Margaretta). 

Like so many Kenyan visual artists, Shabu Mwangi has an amazing story to tell. It’s a story well told through his paintings currently up at One Off Gallery.

Covering everything from his views on international (Evolve Observer) and local politics (Acceptance and Abreast) to more intimate and autobiographical accounts of his family (Family Post mortem and My dream), his former life as a ‘bad boy’ and righteous rebel (Black Moon) and his realisation that he had a higher calling (My shadow) which now inspires him to assist children, the disabled and aspiring young artists through teaching them art.

The challenge of fully appreciating Mwangi’s paintings has to do with his consistent use of subtle symbolism which is not easily deciphered.

Metaphors

He describes his symbols as ‘metaphors’ which make loads of sense once the artist shares his interpretation of his work, something that he graciously did for me during the first days of his show at One Off, his second solo exhibition there and his third overall with the first one held at Le Rustique in 2012.

Having lived most of his 29 years in Mukuru ‘slum’ in Nairobi, Mwangi has had the good fortune of doing art in school from the time he was in pre-primary.

He learnt the skills of print - and mosaic-making while attending the Rubin Centre in Eastlands where he discovered early that an artist didn’t necessarily need costly materials to be creative. He made mosaics with raw maize, beans and glue, and created prints using banana stalks and leaves.

Drop out

But as much as he learned early that he had a knack for the arts, Mwangi was rebellious, having unmentionable troubles at home which led to him to drop out of school. Getting an education on the streets of Nairobi, he eventually made his way to the Matrix Education Centre in Buru Buru where he was able to study on his own, take the necessary exams and complete his ‘O’ levels with good marks.

At 17, he had the good fortune of meeting Kaafiri Kariuki at the Mukuru Art Centre together with a number of aspiring young artists. It was an encounter that shaped the rest of his career since Kaafiri (who founded MAC) saw Mwangi’s potential and gave him a job working in the Centre’s gallery and shop that sold the students’ art.

“But once we’d graduated from the Centre [in 2004] we didn’t have anywhere to go,” recalled Mwangi who decided there and then to start his own Wajuku Project where he and other MAC artists would explore ways of making and marketing their art.

That’s also when his work of teaching art to Mukuru’s children began, work that he’s continued in his Kids Club every weekend since.

ISK art club

Wajuku Project opened up many opportunities for Mwangi. He began working with art students at the International School of Kenya, which led to the Project mounting an exhibition to fundraise for its own centre and workshop.

The funds raised were more than matched with ISK art club’s contribution to building Wajuku’s mabati-walled art centre and studio.

Then in 2010, Mwangi’s work with slum children attracted the interest of an Italian NGO, MOCI or Movement for International Co-operation.

Wajuku

“Through MOCI we’re also teaching art to disabled youth in Makueni. The group also helped us build a second structure for the Kids Club,” adds Mwangi who noted that the new building not only has space for teaching the children but also has an art gallery and library which will be officially launched on June 16 by Carine Ouvry, wife of the Belgian Ambassador, who has helped fill Wajuku’s shelves with art books and books on many other subjects.

Fortunately, running the Wajuku Project isn’t all Mwangi does.

His painting style has evolved significantly since his first one-man show at Le Rustique. He uses far more colour in his work now than he did previously; but he continues to tell sensitive (albeit cryptic) stories through his art.

Most of his work at One Off is mixed media on canvas, although two of his paintings are on the burnt mabati he salvaged from the 2012 Sinai fire that devastated a whole section of the Mukuru slums.

One hallmark of Mwangi’s art is his sensitivity to the plight of the poor, the disabled, the abused and discriminated against, including the Somali population which he feels have been unfairly stereotyped.

Mwangi did an art residency in Germany in 2012 which enabled him to travel all over Europe. But he never intended to stay abroad.

“My home is Mukuru and that’s where it’s always been and always will be.”

Shabu Mwangi’s paintings will be up at One Off Gallery up to June 24th.

ESMOND BRADLEY MARTIN: MARTYR IN THE WAR ON WILDLIFE

BY Margaretta wa Gacheru (posted 7 February 2018)

The war on wildlife and wildlife activists isn’t new, especially in East Africa where a string of world-acclaimed conservationists have died under violent circumstances in the past few years. They include everyone from Joy and George Adamson to Joan Root, Dian Fossey and the attempted murder last year of Kuki Gallmann.

But the war was hard hit last weekend when Dr. Esmond Bradley Martin, one of the world’s leading investigators of illegal trafficking of ivory and rhino horn, was found stabbed to death by his wife Chrysee in their Lavington home last Sunday afternoon.

News of the American geographer’s death sent shockwaves throughout the global conservation community which knew Dr. Martin, 75, for decades through his ground-breaking reports on wildlife trophy trafficking.

Condolences have poured in, particularly as he was renowned for his pioneering work, not only in investigating global markets that traffic in wildlife trophies, but also for providing statistical data that’sbeen used to change government policies affecting the trade of tusks and rhino horns.

In China particularly, while he was serving as UN special envoy for rhino conservation, his statistics helped persuade that country to shut down its legal trade in rhino horn (1993) and later in ivory (2017).

There’s no clear-cut motive for why Dr Martin was murdered, despite Nairobi DCI boss Nicholas Kamwende having arrested three members of the Martins’ house help who were off-duty last Sunday.

It’s been suggested that his demise was an unintended consequence of a botched robbery. But nothing in his bedroom was out of place apart from a few missing notes related to a report on which he’d been working on the state of Nairobi National Park.

“Revenge in more likely the motive that got Esmond murdered,” says Nani Croze, a fellow environmental activist who knew Dr Martin from the time he first came to Kenya in the early 1970s.

“Esmond made many enemies,” opined Alan Donovan who also worked with his fellow American on numerous wildlife projects. “He was also a co-founder of the [Joseph and Sheila] Murumbi Trust.”

According to Donovan and others, Dr Martin should have had a much tighter security team since he was exposing illegal activities of some of the world’s most notorious gangsters. These were gangs that often used the same networks to traffic tusks and rhino horns as they used to traffic drugs and children.

In fact, Dr Martin was so passionate about exposing trophy traffickers and illegal markets in ivory and horns that he occasionally went undercover. He’d assume the role of a buyer in order to obtain information on black market sales in wildlife trophies.

Some of his most detailed and damaging reports were on the research he did in Asia, particularly in China, Vietnam, Laos and most recently in Myanmar. He was said to be compiling his Myanmar report when he was killed.

Most of Dr. Martin’s more recent Asia reports were co-authored with Lucy Vigne, a wildlife consultant who worked with ‘Save the Elephants.’ But he’d also discovered trophy trafficking in the USA, Nigeria, Congo and Angola. 

In his last BBC interview in 2016, Martin, a New Yorker by birth, identified one of the biggest problems in the conservation equation to be corruption and mismanagement of the region’s wildlife resources. In other words, his enemies could have been local as well as global.

Apart from his prolific reporting on the illegal trade in wildlife trophies, Martin was distinctive for his eccentric appearance. With his snow-white wavy mane and dapper style of dress (always in a suit and never missing a handkerchief tucked in his jacket breast pocket that matched his tie), he could easily be mistaken for a tourist. Not an intrepid researcher who stalked poachers, gangsters and wildlife trophy buyers all over the world.

Dr Ian Douglas Hamilton, founder of Save the Elephants, described Dr Martin as ‘an unsung hero’ who dared to work in some of the most remote and dangerous parts of the world.

To those who recognize that there’s a global war on wildlife going on, Dr. Martin has been deemed a martyr to the cause of saving the world’s wildlife. His unrelenting desire to investigate and expose the culprits killing off the earth’s innocent creatures for greed and personal gain make him a model that other environmental activists can proudly emulate.

SANIFUL, HEARTS OF ART & SPELLCAST ALL BACK ALL BACK ON STAGE

LOTS OF THEATRE TO CHOOSE FROM

BY Margaretta wa Gacheru (posted 7 Febuary 2018)

While the Phoenix Theatre isn’t likely to ‘rise from the ashes’ very soon (as the bird did in the Greek myth), Kenyan actors (some of whom were Phoenix regulars) haven’t been deterred from rising in their own right.

This weekend, starting tonight, ex-Phoenix cast members Justin Mirichii and Joyce Musoke are co-starring in ‘My Better Halves’ at Alliance Francaise. It’s the premier performance for Sanifu Productions, a quirky comedy touching on sensitive issues, like mental health and marital strife, written by Mirichii himself.

Directed by Martin Kigondu (who’s normally seen directing his own scripts with Prevail Arts Productions), Mirichii plays a psychiatrist treating his own split personality and not handling it too well.

Meanwhile, over at PAWA254, Walter Sitati is back on stage this weekend with Hearts of Art performing in ‘All I ever wanted.’

Sitati also wrote this ‘political and social satire’ which was previously staged back in 2016. But according to the playwright, the script has been serious ‘tweaked’ and revised to stay attuned to these times.

The show has a substantial cast. It’s still a courtroom drama with Peter Kawa as the Judge, Sitati and Ellsey O. Adhiambo as Counsels and a slew of witnesses.

Sitati’s scripts are always entertaining and deeply engaging. He’s one of Nairobi’s best although he was silent in 2017.

Meanwhile, set texts are having a hearing right now at the Sarakasi Dome Theatre. From this past Wednesday through 17 February, students will have a chance to see Jicho Four’s interpretation of ‘Kigogo’ by Pauline Kea and ‘The River and the Source’ by Margaret Ogola. The following month Jicho Four will also stage Ken Walibora’s ‘Kidagaa Kimemwozea and Bertolt Brecht’s Caucasian Chalk Circle.

A few weeks later, Nairobi Performing Arts Studio will also stage ‘Kigogo’ and ‘Caucasian Chalk Circle’ but at Kenya National Theatre. There’s bound to be a big difference between the two different interpretations, but it will be for the public to come and judge.

NPAS will also be staging the award-winning South African musical ‘Sarafina’ in April. What’s ironic is that the following month, Spellcast Media will also perform ‘Sarafina’ at the Braeburn Theatre. Spellcast actually put on ‘Sarafina’ first in 2015 as the company’s premier production.

“That is why we want to bring the musical back again,” says Andrew Tumbo, the show’s musical director. “We were brand new back then. Now we’re a more seasoned company,” he adds.

HEARTSTRINGS' FIRST THINGS FIRST REVIEWED 2.18

WEDLOCK FOR BETTER OR WORSE
 

BY Margaretta wa Gacheru (posted 7 February 2018)

Heartstrings sparkled last Sunday afternoon as they staged their last day of ‘First things First’ before a full-house crowd that was totally attuned to the singular topic of their production.

For while Marriage seems somewhat out of fashion these days, given all the stories of disappearing dads and woe-begotten single moms, Heartstrings’ show proved marriage is still a topic that resonates in the public domain.

Staged just in time for Valentine’s Day, when courting is meant to swing into high gear and ‘romantic love’ (accompanied by roses, sweets and other luxuries) is a major marketing tool, ‘First things First’ was apparently meant to alert both men and women to beware!

Beware of what could come next (after the ceremonial event) since wedlock isn’t what you think. It’s problematic whichever way you go. That’s the reality that might explain why so many young people practice the ‘come-we-stay’ relationship. It’s the kind that has no strings attached and is possibly even more problematic than wedlock, but that’s a subject for a different Heartstrings script.

This one explores pre-marital positioning from various perspectives, all of which bring home the point that marriage, like many institutions in Kenya currently, has been corrupted in so many ways.

‘First things first’ initially takes us to the Attorney General’s office where simple civil marriages take place in minutes. The red tape bureaucratic paper work is a bit confusing to Muui (Victor Nyaata). But it’s the message from both married men at the AG’s (Kiiui and Muuwawa played by Nick Qwach and Cyprian Osoro respectively) that hints at the heart of the problem.

“Be prepared,” Kiiui cautions. “Not that marriage is ‘bad’ but be prepared for change,” he warns. In other words, people change once they are wed.

The litany of marital horrors shared among the two married guys is hilarious but disheartening and deeply misogynous. But Muui is not deterred, not even when his fiancée, Florence (Nimo Adelyne) arrives and we realize she’s had an unsavory history with Cyprian’s character Muuwawa.

But then, Act Two takes us to an alternative route to wedlock, the ‘proper’ Christian one. But this one looks even worse that the AG’s since we’re given a brilliant portrait of the classic conman (Nick Qwach again), the so-called Christian hustler-hypocrite who’s got a smooth, money-churning church machine, all designed to stuff the preacher’s and his colleagues’ pockets with poor people’s hard-earned pennies.

Nick and Cyprian both get double cast in Act 2 as they serve as the pastor and his right-hand huckster con-man who hands out mandatory forms to be filled by the couple with cash attached.

It’s painful to watch the pastor’s smooth but sinister hustle since he also seems to have his own serial sex service that enlists most female members of the church. Fortunately, Muui and Florence get fed up and walk away.

Finally, they try to traditional route. They go to Flo’s village where her peasant relations have also been corrupted by a dowry (bride-price) system that, like the church, never stops making monetary demands on the man.

What’s truly refreshing about ‘First thing first’ is the resolution. It comes from the couple who try to do the right thing and are virtually defeated at every established turn that they take. Clearly, something new has to happen if marriage is going to work in the 21^st century.

One sees an inkling of that new model in Victor and Adelyne’s characters when they stand up together and tell off both the church conmen and the villagers, all of whom are out not for the couple’s happiness but for their own personal gain.

So now, what’s required, it would seem, is for couples to look seriously into their own motivations for marriage and then go the way they feel is best.

The two factors that Heartstrings left out were the parents and future in-laws. But these too will serve as another script.

Numerous friends of Heartstrings were heard requesting the group stage extra performances of ‘First things First’ since it was sold out before they could watch. But director Sammy Mwangi says it’s not possible since the troupe is already deep into developing their next show.

‘Snake in the Grass’ will run from 1-4 March at Alliance Francaise.

NEW THREADS: ART WITH A FEMINIST TOU

                                    Opening night at Circle Art's New Threads: Process and Materials show 2.18

By Margaretta wa Gacheru (posted 1 February 2018)

                                                                      Malisa with her Divinity Volcano weave

Circle Art Gallery is breaking new ground with its current ‘New Threads’ exhibition which opened last Wednesday and runs through 24 February.

                                                                                      Collage by Asteria Malinzi

With a view to ‘investigating’ the process of creative expression as well as the materials involved in such an endeavor, all twelve young artists have been given a free pass to explore new terrain without the pressure of perfecting a finished product. It’s that sense of possibility and freedom that permeates the ‘New Threads’ show.

At the same time, it also feels like risky business inviting artists to pay more attention to the process of creation than to the final outcome. The same could be said in the case of miscellaneous materials used by the twelve.

Their materials range from plastics, papers and assorted textiles and threads to violin cases, Kaunda suits and video footage. But what matters is the way each of the artists—all of whom except for Tahir Karmali, are women -- work with the materials of their choice.

Agnew Waruguru Njoroge's wall hanging

As it turns out ‘New Threads: investigating process and material” is fanciful and fun. It’s filled with delightful discoveries, especially related to new talents emerging on the local art scene.

By happenstance, a number of them are currently out of the country. For instance, Maral Bolouri is in Paris, Souad Abdel Rassoul in Cairo, Wambui Wamae-Kamiru Collymore’s in London, Tahir Karmali’s in New York, Asteria Malinzi’s in Dar es Salaam and Wanja Kimani in Cambridgeshire.

But in a way, that only adds to the show’s  richness since their works are wide-ranging in originality and innovative styles. Plus the blend of the solid (Tamayo’s concrete and bronze footballs) and the fluid (Waruguru’s plastic ‘waterfall’) make for a delicious mix of feminist art.

                                                  Wanja Kimani's video: it's not you, it's me

 

The processes themselves are diverse. Wanja Kimani and Jackie Karuti both work in storytelling video while Soaud Abdel Rassoul, Syowia Kyambi and Wambui Collymore each display different concepts of an installation.

One could describe Joanne Patterson Tamayo’s footballs as sculptures, each echoing the homemade plastic-bag balls she’d seen in her youth. Agnes Waruguru Njoroge’s cascading plastic pink and white shredded sheets suggest a free-flowing sort of sculpture as well.

Souad's violin cases

 

What’s irresistible is Waruguru’s mixed media wall-hanging (once a bedroom curtain) sparsely covered in embroidery stitched and mixed with shredded Kanga samples.

Asteria Malinzi also works with Kanga only her five collages are more like paintings comparable somehow to Nadia Kisseleva’s award-winning beaded linen works, understated in their elegance.

Maral Bolouri is the only one of the 12 to create a mobile hung with feminist images that continue exploring themes of gender, identity and sexuality

Both Maliza Kiasuwa and Tahir Karmali created wall-hangings for this show. Both address complex issues of nationality and history. Otherwise, the two are different in every way. Tahir’s process of papermaking is infused with political and historical themes while Maliza’s monumental wooly wall piece is ablaze with a regal raffia grass crown, a lava-like landing and thick wild-fire red yarn. Aptly named “Nyirogongo, the Divinity Volcano,” hers recalls the one that erupted in Eastern Congo, near Maliza’s home in 2002.

Her majestic diety is one of my favorite works in this show matched only by Souad Abdel Rassoul’s three exquisitely-painted violin cases which also echo her people’s (classical) history. For in ancient Egypt, the coffins of elites were painted with portraits of the deceased. Souad’s cases are meant to be reminiscent of those ancient coffins, only hers are contemporary works of art. But just as the ancient coffins were meant to memorialize the eternal life of the deceased, Souad’s portraits also bestow an enduring vitality to her violin cases.

The fact that 11 of the 12 artists in ‘New Threads’ are women is especially exciting since women exhibitions in Kenya are rare. If they happen at all, they’re usually held in March coincidental with International Women’s Day on March 8.  But the exhibition’s curator Danda Jaroljmek chose to ‘jump the gun’ by starting off the new year with newly emancipated voices of women.

New Threads is a show to be studied, not perused casually. It’s not the sort of exhibition that initially makes a lot of sense since people tend to believe art galleries are for viewing aesthetically-pleasing artworks. But this exhibition challenges the viewer to work along with the artists to ‘investigate’ not just a finished work, but also the media and the modalities of their creative processes. It’s a fascinating new way of appreciating contemporary Kenyan art.

 

MEN'S JEWELLERY: A PERFECT VALENTINE GIFT

BY Margaretta wa Gacheru (posted 5 February 2018)

For the man who has everything or wishes that he had [it all], what do you get him for Valentine’s Day?

                                                                  Hina looks at a showcase full of men's jewellery at Joo and Co.
You can’t go wrong with a bit of gold or sterling silver topped up with a touch of gem stone, preferably a diamond, ruby, pearl or emerald!

In fact, Joo and Co. in the New Wing of the Village Market just opened up a Men’s Line of luxury jewellery and can hardly keep it fully stocked.

“As it turns out, Nairobi has a big appetite for men’s jewellery,” says Faisal Joo, the great, great, great, great grandson of the original Joo who founded the family’s first jewellery and furrier business back in India in the 1840s.

It’s the 18 and 14 karat gold wedding cum engagement bands that have been the quickest to sell out, says Faisal who only had one elegant white gold ring for men in the store on the day BD Life came calling. It was inlaid with a finely faceted royal blue tanzanite gemstone.

“But we’ll be re-stocking the men’s jewellery line in time for Valentine’s Day, adds Joo’s store manager, Hina Bhundia.

For the man who likes to be discrete about his taste in jewellery, a leather bracelet or necklace is also very cool. The leather wrist bands come in both natural brown and white (with black cross stitching) embellished with silver bars. They are finely braided with a silver clasp.

The most elegant wrist band that I saw that day was a combination of alternating gold and diamond stones embellished with ebony wooden balls. They were all strung on a sturdy elastic band. It’s the sort of bejeweled accessory that a man can wear comfortably whatever the occasion.

But the men’s jewellery that gives a girl the greatest variety of choice are the cuff links. They come in both gold and silver settings with the gemstones being the feature that accentuates the luxurious taste and style of the giver.

Gemstones available in jewellery stores like Joo and Co. are wide ranging although they mostly come from East Africa, primarily Tanzania and Kenya. One of the most popular gemstones that men can wear on either formal or casual occasions are Tanzanites which come in various shades of royal blue.

But then the Tsavorite stone comes in a glorious shade of green (and looks a bit like jade or even emerald). The Citrine comes in a sunshine yellow while the tiger’s eye in a golden brown.

The most stunning set of cuff links that I saw at Joo and Co.’s was a pair of sterling silver elephants trimmed in mother of pearl tusks and deep red ruby eyes.

But then, men might also want to think about the jewellery they can share with their sweethearts on Valentine’s Day. There’s little doubt that one of the quickest ways to woo a beautiful woman is with an elegant pair of diamond, pearl or sterling silver earrings. Necklaces and delicate pendants will also suffice when it comes to melting most women’s hearts.

And of course, a decision to replace your wife’s wedding ring with a brand new set of diamond engagement and wedding rings can easily rekindle the spark that started off that love affair in the first place.

So while some may say that elegant jewellery is a luxury, not a necessity, it’s certainly a sure thing to share with a sweetheart for Valentine’s Day.

But let money be no object when it comes to high-end jewellery since luxury is by definition pricey. For instance, there’s a marked difference between men’s cuff links made of sterling silver verses links made of white gold. The silver ones are just KSh9,700 while those made of white gold are Sh120,000.

Leather wrist bands and necklaces can be the most reasonable item of men’s jewellery since they can range from Sh3,500 to Sh5000 and Sh6500 respectively.

But the cost of an item like the diamond ring is not easily calculated off the cuff since they come in so many different styles, cuts and karats that one needs to go straight to the store with your Valentine and make that key decision together.  

WHAT’S UP IN NAIROBI ART WORLD, February 2, 2018

+ Nairobi Gallery presents Yony Wa-Ite’s ‘Ecce Homo, An Encounter with Early Machismo & Migrants Forever, from 28 January.

+ Lord Errol Gallery and Food Fair Saturday, February 3 from 9am-5pm

+ Circle Art Gallery presents ‘New Threads: Investigating Processes and Materials’, Feb.1, 6-8pm

+ Maasai Mbili presents ‘Ni Nyumbani?’ With Anitah Kavotcy, Kevo Stero and Black Odhiambo, Feb. 17^th

+ Brush tu Art Open House, Feb. 11, Buru Buru 1

+ Kobo Gallery presents Lemek Tompoika’s ‘In-Between’ exhibition, Feb. 3-4.

+ Tamarind Tree Hotel presents Photography by Georgina Goodwin, Neil Thomas and Anthony Russell, opening Feb. 15.

+ Metta Gallery presents Gemini Vaghela’s Breaking Illusions’ exhibition, opening 2 February--2 March.

+ At Fairmont Norfolk Hotel, Little Gallery presents Coster Ojwang’s ‘Contemporary Impressions’ paintings from 2 February at 6pm –17 February.