By margaretta
wa Gacheru (posted March 8, 2017)
Kenyan artists
are on a roll! (That might be partially why Alliance Francaise is currently
exhibiting artworks by nearly 20 local artists in a show entitled ‘Pop and
Roll’.)
The number
of solo and group exhibitions underway at the moment is impressive indeed!
For
instance, Tom Mboya has a one-man show at the British Institute of East Africa.
Moses Nyawenda has one up at the United Nations Recreation Centre in Gigeri. Dennis
Muraguri has his matatu prints hanging inside the Picazzo Restaurant at The Hub.
His prints are just one floor above the mall’s new super-sized steel Coffee
Tree by Peter Ngugi, on permanent display in the heart of The Hub.
Allan
Githuka has a marvelous solo exhibition at One Off Gallery. Githuka had been
working underground in Ngecha for several years, so his current exhibition is welcomed
and quite refreshing. It also reflects a subtle refinement of his style and use
of color, especially apparent is his glorious landscapes. His blend of thickly
textured colors has a magical, almost mesmeric effect. His hills seem almost semi-abstract,
as if they could be anywhere after rains, which sadly have been absent in the
country for quite some time.
The most
prominent group exhibition is ‘Pop and Roll’ at Alliance Francaise where an
eclectic set of mainly paintings occupy two floors. According to Alliance’s new
director, Cedric , the works have been assembled thematically, according to the
Western genre of ‘Pop Art.’ But it’s a stretch to see how Michael Soi’s voluptuous
maidens correlate with Alex Njoroge’s weaponized war tanks or Kerosh Kiruri’s
Old Wisdom.
Nonetheless,
if one looks a bit more carefully, one might see how nearly all the work
reflects features of Kenyans’ everyday life. [Ms1] For
instance, a number of artists have painted iconic characters, from Msale’s Fela
Kuti and Chinua Achebe, Richard Kuria’s Beatles and Anthony Maina’s exotic
white women sirens to Solo’s Wutang Clan, Nduta Kariuki’s flawless portraits of
local youth and Kerosh’s aged Old Wisdom covered in wrinkles and wise maxims.
Then too, who doesn’t appreciate Muraguri’s Matatus, Bertiers’s life-sized
Journalist, Wycliffe Opondo’s wily portraits of urban street life and even Soi’s
visual exposes of Nairobi’s ‘no holds barred’ night life.
So it’s okay
to take a genre straight from the States and use it to classify Kenyan art.
That’s what many art critics and curators do. My qualm with Alliance Francaise isn’t
with the quality of the art. It has to do with Alliance breaking with a
cultural tradition that it’s established over the past few years in the month
of March. This is the month when International Women’s Day used to be celebrated
with art that was either by, for or about women and girls.
Alliance’s
forgetting that time-honored tradition is a heart breaker to those of us who
have treasured this one opportunity in a year when Kenyan women’s art gets
exclusively showcased. This year, there’s only Nduta, Joan Otieno and Blaine
whose art is on display. Otherwise, there’s only one solo show in town that
pays specific tribute to the female gender. Jeffie Magina’s exhibition entitled
‘Butterflies’ at Nairobi National Museum focuses his whole show on the girl
child.
Granted
Jeffie’s been inspired by his own daughter Ella, aged 4, who’s the subject of
many of his more than 50 paintings. Nonetheless, the little girl is seen in
various situations, some sweet as when a big brother shares a sport with his
little sister; while others are scary as when a little girl weeps while her
rapist dresses up to take off.
None of Jeffie’s
paintings are devoid of a salient message and even a sensitive story the artist
can share if he’s in the Museum’s Creativity Gallery.
What’s most
touching about this show is that Jeffie seems to understand the sensitive
psyche of the girl child. His girls are either inquisitive or playful, trapped
in limited gender conventions, lost in a library filled with books or imagining
flying space craft in broad daylight.
Jeffie
describes his little girls, not only Ella, as his ‘Butterflies’ whose
resemblance to angelic figures is telling. So the Museum exhibition somehow
makes up for the forgetfulness of all the other art institutions. I apologize
for sounding nostalgic but perhaps next year, those same centres will remember
International Women’s Day and celebrate it as Jeffie, Ella and the show’s
curator Lydia Galavu have done.
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