Market Place, by Mikiti |
By Andrew Mulenga
Patrick Mumba, Eddie Mumba, Flinto Chandia and Lutanda Mwamba are just a few of Zambia’s most influential painters and sculptors that will have their works on display at Twaya Art-Zambia Gallery, Intercontinental Hotel Lusaka on Tuesday, 16 April at 18:00hrs next week, in what can only be described as a small, but prestigious exhibition.
Visual arts audiences can expect a rare treat when these local artistic masters' works as well as those of Stary Mwaba, Laurey Nevers-Chandia, Angela Chipanda-Ninda, Baba Jakeh, Mikiti and late Paul Kabwe open to the public for two weeks.
Patrick Mumba, Eddie Mumba, Flinto Chandia and Lutanda Mwamba are just a few of Zambia’s most influential painters and sculptors that will have their works on display at Twaya Art-Zambia Gallery, Intercontinental Hotel Lusaka on Tuesday, 16 April at 18:00hrs next week, in what can only be described as a small, but prestigious exhibition.
Visual arts audiences can expect a rare treat when these local artistic masters' works as well as those of Stary Mwaba, Laurey Nevers-Chandia, Angela Chipanda-Ninda, Baba Jakeh, Mikiti and late Paul Kabwe open to the public for two weeks.
Wood Sculpture (detail), by Eddie Mumba |
However, collectors should leave their cheque books
and wallets at home since none of the 16 works on display will be on sale because
they are all part of what used to be the Embassy of the Kingdom of Netherlands
collection of contemporary Zambian art that has now been donated to Lechwe
Trust as part of its vast collection.
The work has been collected over a period of time
during the Netherlands years of operation in Zambia, and according to a report
by Lechwe Trust Vice-Chairperson William Miko; the donation of the artworks was
prompted by the Embassy’s proposed closure of its Mission in Zambia.
And Dutch foreign
minister Uri Rosenthal recently announced the closure of four embassies in
African countries including Zambia as part of an effort to modernise embassy
services and re-focus the priorities for Dutch foreign policy.
Miko states that
before outgoing Ambassador Harry Molinaar left Zambia, he had been an avid
admirer of Lechwe Trust’s art collection and its commitment towards supporting
arts activities. Molinaar met with Lechwe chairperson Cynthia Zukas MBE to whom
he indicated his willingness to support the trust in one way or another.
Street Children by Mc Donald Nkhoma |
Molinaar later
wrote to The Hague suggesting the donation of the mission’s collection to
Lechwe Trust and the headquarters responded in the affirmative. As of Friday last
week, all the works were taken down from the former Netherlands Embassy offices
and hauled for some minor restoration activities in readiness for Tuesday’s
exhibition. The suggestion of an exhibition itself was advanced by current Head of Mission/Development
Co-operation Ardi Stoios-Braken and it will serve as a public hand-over event
with invited guests and a guest of honour, most likely a senior government
official, Tourism and Arts Minister Sylvia Masebo is a likely bet.
For followers of Zambian art, this small
collection does hold some historic significance. Take the sculptures for instance;
they are a good example of the period in sculpture before power tools as well
as the current power tools era.
The other sculptures in the collection by
Chandia, Mumba, Chipanda-Ninda and Baba Jakeh represent the power tool era. Obviously
tools such as electric grinders became more easily accessible from the early 1990s
onwards.
An early work by Stary Mwaba shows a totally different style from what the artist employs today |
Nevertheless, the choice of Lechwe Trust by the Dutch
could not have been any better, under the passionate leadership of Zukas MBE
the Trust has for a long time collected Zambian art in an effort to keep it
within her borders and at a very high cost if one might add. The works will
definitely be at home among the hundreds of others collected by Lechwe over the
years even if their home is still a 40 foot container.
It does however raise some thoughts. Why would the Dutch
opt to leave the works in the hands of a private trust that is going to box
them away because it is yet to commence the construction of a gallery? Why not
donate them to the government of the day for them to beautify their spaces of
choice, government offices or parliament maybe? Why not ship them to The Hague
as a memento from Zambia?
Although unofficial, the
answer to these three questions is simple. As much as Zambia may have an arts
ministry, from the lowest to the highest echelons of our society we are still
too aesthetically blind to appreciate art, period, and shamefully so. No matter
what levels of education we attain we remain artistically illiterate, probably even our Paleolithic ancestors, the prehistoric cavemen had a better use for art than we do,
so yes, why not give the works to someone who will lock them away for safer
keeping until a time when they will be appreciated, probably thousands of years
from now as we currently marvel when we gaze upon the prehistoric rock paintings
of Kalemba in Chadiza, Chifubwa Stream in Solwezi or Mwela Rocks in Kasama,
someone will one day appreciate what is today Zambian contemporary art.
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