Sunday, March 25, 2012

Of Counterfeits, Fakes & Cheap Imitations


I love the Kenyan art scene! It’s (probably) all based in Nairobi – the big city in the (currently very hot) sun. This may be due to the fact that whatever infrastructure that exists for the arts, is city based. Also, a large chunk of the direct consumers of Kenyan contemporary culture is tucked in the high-rise blue chip companies and multinationals or the leafy suburbs that house the countless expatriates who ply their trade with the UN.

Indigenous Kenyans too are slowly starting to ‘partake’ of art though this is limited mainly to the Yuppies – Young Upwardly Mobile professionals who make up a great percentage of the rapidly growing middle class.

With this scenario on an upward curve, there seems to be a ‘boom’ in the art business locally and just like the California gold rush of 1848 - 1855, no one wants to miss the gravy train.

Artists are – (un)fortunate (for luck of a better word). With or without a boom, they have to open their studios daily. They have to be inspired to create.  They have to respond to their spaces. They have to interrogate humanity – socially, politically etc. It is their duty.  And this loosely translates to – New artworks being created daily.

Sometimes the artist understands and can articulate the Whats? and Whys? about their work. Sometimes they do go the whole nine yards and even curate their projects. Most of the time though, they let the professionals do it. And that’s my beef for the day!

Professionals? Who are these professionals? You see, Art is strange. Stranger than love. Than Religion. Than Science. The artist is (supposed to be) God! He is the creator. But there are others who hover around him. Those, who live off him. They, who are irrelevant without the artist but have somehow managed to convince themselves that in the contemporary art hierarchy, the artist is at the bottom of the food chain! (Read Seven Days In The Art World by Sarah Thornton)

They come in different forms, shapes, colours and titlesArt Dealers, Curators, Art Theorists, Art Historians… the list is endless. With all due respect, I have many a friend (or rather know many people) falling in this category and some I hold in high regard. Unfortunately back at home (read Kenya), Hmmmm! The situation is fluid – these are deemed as ‘cool occupations’. A mechanic bored of popping them hoods, becomes an Art Dealer. A retired Montessori teacher catches the curatorial bus… anyone whose career is going through a rough patch finds a safe haven in the arts!

That’s okay. It starts being un-okay when you have 20 curators doing incoherent projects all over town. When you have uninformed  ‘art historians’  and ‘theorists’ who are clueless about the Kenyan art scene now, and what it was like 5 or 10 years ago. It stops being okay when you have intellectually lazy people carelessly using respectable titles doing silly (again, for lack of a better word) projects that equate to nothing. Those that, are not at all relevant/useful within our context. People who are not intelligent enough to interpret/articulate the conversations from the global podium within the local stage.

If a city has 10 art dealers, 5 curators, 3 theorists… and 3 dozen artists, you expect it to be abuzz with a handful of good curated exhibitions, maybe an Annual Art Fair and probably one or two intellectually nourishing journal/newsletter/book – whatever!
You’d expect to feel the Kenyan presence in Biennales & International Art Fairs – because that’s what the real curators I know do.

But what do we have? A handful of dudes with fancy titles, living off artist commissions from sales of artworks in small cafes and corporate corridors. People with no medal whatsoever to show for their several years of  fancy titles. Not an event. Not a text; Like a singer without a song. Or a painter without a painting. People who prey for any social gathering so that they have another chance to introduce themselves while attaching buzz words/titles to their names… Ogonga Thom, Independent Curator… Michael Soi, Art Dealer Extraordinaire… John Kamicha, Art Theorist & Critic etc.

This makes the local art scene feel like a circus of wannabes. And with every sunrise we have to navigate a field full of fakes, counterfeits & cheap imitations.

Monday, March 19, 2012

Abuse of Office

Of all the occupations known to man, none operates without a code of conduct that stipulates the acceptable rules and regulations. This also includes consequences should these be breached. All, except one. The doctors have their Medical Practitioners & Dentists Board, the lawyers – Law Society of Kenya, lecturers – University Academic Staff Union, hawkers too have something like Nairobi Petty Traders Association!

Visual Arts, a career that falls loosely between a job and a divine calling, one full of royalty, and geniuses, and those whose places are reserved next to the almighty, is governed by… NOTHING!

Before you cast your first stone… let’s make this clear: I am not advocating for ARTIST CENCORSHIP!

When an artist abuses his privilege (freedom of expression) and creates work that is culturally, socially, or religiously offensive, how is the audience supposed to deal with it? If in an attempt to create a sensation, the artworks become an insult, how is the intended audience supposed to react?

It is known that artists (not only the creators but their groupies who include curators, dealers, theorists, historians etc) enjoy any publicity. This includes any outrage as a result of offensive work.

Damaso's controversial painting.
In July 2010, South African artist Yuill Damaso reveled in the limelight after making a painting depicting the autopsy of Nelson Mandela. Abomination! Can the same artist depict his father, or mother, or girlfriend dead?! Or did he just need the world’s most popular sage to help his selfish cause? According to Damaso, that was his way of paying tribute to Nelson Mandela!

Similarly, Danish artist duo Surrend ( which comprises Jan Eggesborg & Pia Betelsen) depicted the Danish Royal family in a pornographic cartoon that even the bluest of blue film industry will not be able to achieve in the near future. 
Surrend's cartoon
When does the artist cross the social commentary/entertainment/protest line and blur the focus turning into a subjective, insulting, sensation seeking wanna-be? Or are they just hirelings of a third party? Sometimes I think most of these artists are just victims of handouts for which they will do anything the hand that giveth asks. Talk of “He who pays the pipe calls the tune.”

Back home, Kenyans have been marveling at a series of graffiti of what should have been a subject in school. The interesting thing about it is that it loosely falls in the guerilla art movement and hits the Kenyan politician with bare knuckles. It makes for a very successful artwork without being offensive and it’s probably the artwork that has gotten the most attention recently (debatable).

Graffiti by Anonymous artists in downtown Nairobi
Another artist (who I can’t stop calling a moron) has used the same instruments (spray paint), the same platform (public wall space) and the same subject (the Kenyan politician) and expects me (and you) to salute him at the guerilla parade! This artist has trashed the whole philosophy of social responsibility by artists and expects Kenyans to forget a good lesson urging us to vote wisely – by telling us to vote for the same vulture we’re being warned against! Sadly, it’s not one (bad) painting. Not two… maybe twenty spread all over Nairobi. 

Some of the texts by 'mercenary artists' in Nairobi
As a consumer of this horrible art, who do I complain to? How can I talk to the artist to tell him how I feel about his (bad) artworks? How do I deal with the visual pollution? Should I go see the Mayor/Town Clerk? Am I supposed to get him/her through the politician who commissioned him?


This is just one (pathetic) artist… or maybe just one (body of) work that is offensive… one that you cannot describe using one positive word. But as creative people – artists, curators, writers… how many times have we subjected our audience to something offensive? Artworks that are irritating.

Since we don’t want to be censored, maybe it’s up to us not to abuse our office by engaging in “silly commissions” and soberly being considerate to our intended audience. As a man I considered not very wise once said, “There’s a very thin line between thought-provoking & outright insulting.”

I moved him from the “not very wise” box to the “somehow wise” one.