Management (No Longer) Reserves The Right of Admission

When "Gentleman's Club" opens on Sunday 24th June, it will not only be just another show but a celebration of how far we've come. In terms of technical ability, intellectual capacity and freedom of publicly showing work that was unexhibitable just a couple of years ago.

For most artists, compiling a decent body of work is very fulfilling. Selling is nice (as it helps sort out our material obligations) but getting to show it in a good exhibition is ultimate. Nothing beats the feeling of having your peers in a space -  conventional or otherwise as your work takes centre stage accompanied by the clinking of wine glasses, smell of fresh samosas + spring rolls, a handful of red dots next to the art on show and (semi) intelligent conversations as people gather to celebrate your hard work... or laziness. That to most artists is probably the one and only objective critic session they'll ever have (of course before the brain + alcohol become buddies).

Over the years, our art scene has been labelled as conservative. Meaning we have been afraid. So afraid of what we've called taboo subjects - politics, nudity, religion, sexuality... and anything we put in the box labelled UnAfrican! This translates to some artworks never getting to see the light of day for what are deemed 'cultural reasons'. A polite way of saying your work makes certain people uncomfortable.

You see, artists are... Strange! (for lack of a better word). We live in the same city, go to the same schools, shop in the same stores, read the same books, agree on most things arty but are very individual in our creations. The thing that sets us apart is the one we call inspiration.

Some people are inspired by nature, others religion, others politics, maybe love or fashion or just women. Others seek inspiration in the night.

Spaces, depending on their custodians, have had their fair share of challenges in dealing with all the diverse subjects that come out of artist studios making them sometimes go for the easiest option politically. Censorship.

Not sure who has been a culprit or victim before my time but a handful of times I've been witness and victim.

First was in the year 2001; Patrick Mukabi, Peter Klashorst and myself had worked long & hard to put up what to us was supposed to be a blockbuster show at the East African Contemporary Gallery (Nairobi Museum). All went well till the works got into the space. Curated by Gert Meijerink of the Amsterdam Institute of Painting, the show was titled "Nairobi Day & Night Club" and was a black & white interpretation of the title. Panye had beautiful paintings of graceful women during the day. Klas had very good ones of the not so good people of the night. I had the in between.

Word spread quickly and the management decided to edit the show and remove the culturally offensive work. Protests, blackmails and compromises later, we had a show. Not as blockbuster as we'd have loved but among the few conceptualized shows at the Nairobi Museum.

Come 2005, an artist and dealer got together a posse of artists and put up a show of nude works at Le Rustique restaurant. It was a big hit and someone thought it a good idea to move it to Karen. The works were put up in a high end restaurant till someone called the cops to complain about pornographic stuff in their club.

Some of the paintings were arrested! Not sure what the charge sheet read or how they left the cop shop but knowing Kenya, someone gave and another received. The show ended prematurely!

More recently, Michael Soi aka the Snakedoctor was to have a show whose content was the going ons in the mushrooming Nairobi strip clubs. He couldn't show the work as the 'expected audience' would be offended. I was personally offended as it was censoring within a creative space. Soi has not been so lucky. He booked and confirmed a show in an upmarket pub & restaurant. The owner soon discovered he intended to show politically motivated paintings and as fate would have it, the show never took off as a regular patron was a big man.

Fast forward and coming Sunday is the opening of the "The Gentleman's Club."

It is a juxtaposition of the two artists’ view of Nairobi with a bias toward the night. Both have been accused of degrading women by portraying them negatively and supporting the vices that come with the still of the night.

Whether they do or not we'll never know (or is irrelevant for now). One thing however is that what happens in Nairobi does happen. Art imitates life. The Nairobi night is perceived as dangerous, heathen, black, ugly & full of sin - gambling, crime, prostitution, bar brawls etc.

Amid all the madness, there is happiness/fun. It is when you enjoy your favourite dinners. When your spouse, or brother or sister is earning their daily bread (honestly). When you're running across town to catch those annoying night flights. When in a bus heading to the village. Or when you make a trip to The Gentleman's Club! At such times there's alot to see! Some of us close our eyes because what we see is not pretty. But some open them wider, and stare! Because they know they shall reference those moments in their work. When making their art.

Those that closed their eyes (and they that were seen) will be upset by the artworks generated from those moments. They will do all in their power to stop the work from being seen. They shall burry their heads in the sand and believe that these things did not happen. But come morning, they shall replay these nightly topics discussed graphically on their home radios and car stereos, truly enjoying these taboo subjects.

Maybe the power of a picture (read painting) is so overwhelming and plays with our conscience hence the resistance. We're okay with having strip club adverts in our daily newspapers and at bus stops (high density public platforms) but it's not okay for artists to exhibit works inspired by this culture in (semi) public spaces. Don't know why, but one thing is for sure, come Sunday, for the first time artists have a rare chance of going all out - all guns blazing & bare knuckled to show their studio output without being worried about censorship & terms like sensitive audiences, culturally offensive blah blah blah! And it’ all for arts sake.

It's not often that artists are ‘Free To Decide’ what to show as someone else's opinion carries the day. So am really looking forward to the vernissage on Sunday. Cold beer on the Snakedoctor if you can find your way to One Off Contemporary Art Gallery #16 Rosslyn Lone Tree Nairobi.

Built on Quicksand, Sustained by Hype

I never met Ruth Schaffner!

I must also admit my work has never found its way into Gallery Watatu with the exception of it passing through for framing by Owino - the late resident framer, en route to other spaces for exhibitions. Most of the (not so) young artists probably sail the same boat as I in that they also have never exhibited there; whether it’s by choice or by being locked out is a story for another day! From Kyalo, Mukabi, Michael Soi, Jimmah Kimani, Peterson Kamwathi, Beatrice Wanjiku, Anthony Okello, Peter Walala, Jimmy Ogonga... a large percentage of those referred to as 2nd generation Kenyan artists.

So, when last week a local daily carried the story of the “major auction and final closure" not many tears were shed! It was comparable to this week when 2 politicians died and the political class are busy turning well known villains into instant heroes.

Flashback... A little over 40 years ago three artistic friends -Jony Waite, Robin Anderson and David Hart - created a privately-owned space they named "Watatu" - Swahili for 3 people. It is not very clear (or well documented) when it changed hands but the new owner became Ruth Schaffner, a German-born American collector of post-war art.

With Ruth at the helm, Watatu was an instant 'hit' and was home of what was loosely referred to as créme de la créme of indigenous Kenyan (read naive) art. Artists like Jak Katarikawe, Ancent Soi, Sane + Eunice Wadu, Wanyu Brush, Elijah Ooko, Kivuthi Mbuno, Samuel + Jackson Wanjau & Chain Muhandi among others soon became overnight celebrities.

One thing everyone agrees with is that Ruth Schaffner was an art dealer extraordinaire!

Urban legend has it that artist villages, Ngecha and Banana Hill sprouted as a result of Ruth's patronage. Young and ambitious guys out of college would walk into the gallery, head held high armed with a diploma/degree and they would leave crestfallen as they'd be told, "They weren't good enough unless they painted like Sane, or Brush, or Muhandi..."

The strong and maybe too proud, never came back and carried on with their practice minus Watatu. The weak, tried to be like Sane! like Meek Gichugu... and even got cool names to boot!

People 'got rich' and for once Kenyan art 'was on the world map' and then it happened in 1996!

Ruth Schaffner died! There was pandemonium in the art scene. Grown men cried! They did not sob. They wailed.

This was around the same time Kuona Trust and One Off Gallery were starting and all those who never got into Watatu were having alternative spaces to show (and sell). For most of us, Watatu was never an option. It simply wasn't there. For most, the connection was Owino, the framer.

Fast forward and we heard rumours of watatu being broke and some staff hawking artworks to make ends meet but that was private property, and we weren't supposed to trespass!

Then this year - I guess shit hit the fan! Watatu crumbled, and is now falling.

That Watatu is obsolete and going under was never the issue. It was HOW this was happening that most had a problem with. An auction had allegedly taken place and another one was scheduled yet no information was forthcoming. It felt like someone was keen to tie up a good deal in a hush. Fate had it that through social media, information leaked and was shared.

On the day of the second auction, two dozen people in the arts were there, some to claim what was rightfully theirs, some for curiosity, maybe a handful for moral support, some to buy expensive work cheaply and some to just heckle. The gods of creativity got us a reprieve and the auction was postponed to 16th June.

We have accepted that closure is inevitable but does it really matter?

Our beloved RaMoMa 'died' recently. We never mourned and moved on like it never was. Today, Watatu is in High Dependency Unit and we're already shopping for a coffin! A glimpse at www.gallerywatatu.com gives an indicator on who the gallery represented. You won't find the names of the young, prolific award winning Kenyan artists shifting the dynamics of the local art scene. Why? We may never know.

Maybe, before we get all emotional and use words like History, Heritage etcetera, we should define the relationship we had with Watatu, with the institution, with they that ran (down) the space. And when I personally do that, I can say with my head held high that, "I'm not gonna lack sleep over Gallery Watatu's closure."

We have other art spaces/institutions that have gone the same way. We get all mushy when they are in the red then amnesia creeps in immediately they're unable to stay afloat. Is it lack of strategy? Are our institutions too elite? Could it be the personnel? Or is it that we don't support each other? Maybe one day we'll find out. Maybe.

I love quoting strange artists that I meet and a wise one summed it up well... "The old order empires built on quicksand and sustained by hype, are finally crumbling.”

And as this happens, another one inhales on his ciggy, reflects, and as he exhales, with the smoke comes the words, "Nothing, I feel absolutely nothing."

Art Appreciation

Hmmmm… It’s been a while!

We all pretend or assume we know/understand what art is. Maybe we know, maybe we don’t (but that’s a story for another day). When we add the word “appreciation” to our understanding of art, it becomes a totally different ball game.

Art Appreciation is/may be the knowledge and understanding of the qualities that identify all art. Huh! Maybe this is just a polite way of saying art appreciation is one’s ability to withstand art without pretence, peer pressure, fear or favour. This translates to being able to look at artworks and form your own independent opinions about them without necessarily referencing the artist. I think.

However, rather unfortunately with the current trends, art appreciation has become another cliché phrase. It’s the case of nobody gives a damn. Yet we pretend we do!

In the small pond we call Nairobi, art is big business! I know you’re wondering, “How?”

Outside production, 95ish% of art is NGO based. This is big business you know. Most of these institutions have impressive constitutions/missions/visions etc and among them is “improving art appreciation locally” this is loosely referred to as audience development in donor rhetoric.

Sounds noble I guess but sometimes it’s not the ‘Whats?’ that matter, it’s the ‘Hows?’

I love (some) NGOs with The Kenya Red Cross being my favorite. Maybe it’s because I find it being result oriented. However, most of these art based NGOs aka not-for-profit institutions are report-based loosely translating to, “What’s in the report at the end of the year is actually more important (for them) than what actually happened during the year.” Shame.

How do you encourage art appreciation or develop an audience? Everyone working in the arts in Kenya has an answer to this and a great formula on paper to boot. However, that’s exactly where it stops! Strange it is if your job is to develop audiences yet you’re never in the audience yourself at any time of your work. There’s a gig in Nairobi almost bi-weekly. That’s pretty good for our small pond. The audience is almost always the same - the participating artists, two journalists (Frank Whalley + Margaretta Wa Gacheru), two dozen art appreciators, artists and their offspring.

Conveniently absent day in, day out are those mandated with running our art scene! Those that teach our kids (for years in university) how to be artists, those that sit in the ministry (& department of culture), they that are supposed to watch over my practice, they that are supposed to enlighten us and make us appreciate art more, they that we trust with building our audience.

These are not just a handful of people! We’re talking hundreds! A minister here, a couple of assistants, some Permanent Secretary… a whole department in charge of visual arts. Add to these all the cultural managers of all the institutions set up to support and raise the profile of visual arts, then to these add the new kids on the block – Curators.

The latest trend is what practicing artists have christened the Seminar Contemporary Platforms - where “important people in the arts” gather and talk about art. I heard from a wise artist that it’s probably part of the Kenyan Vision 2030 – I believed her.

How do you stop art from seeming cool and elitist during seminars and boardroom tête-à-têtes while allowing it to flourish in its real world? The artists’ studios, the galleries, exhibitions etc. Maybe am using so many words to ask, “When will we see all these art technocrats appear at an art event? Where it’s not about talking while drinking mineral water and making notes on branded five star hotel notepads but appreciating art while having a beer or blended scotch! Where art is visual? Not verbal”

How this rhetoric trickles down to the mainstream practice remains to be seen/felt.

My take is that it would be very difficult to convince your mechanic, or my bartender, or the house help to attend an art event or to try having a conversation with an artwork if you, the person living off art(ists) seems clueless or uninterested in doing the same.

Maybe we should be trying to convince ourselves to be part of the audience. Just maybe.