After just a couple of weeks in New York I am off again to London to see the 1:54 African art fair. I will be arriving after everybody as I am stuck in New York being a good citizen by doing jury duty and visiting my mother who has Alzheimer’s and no longer knows who I am though she gives me more kisses and hugs than during all her sane years. She is the reason I got so interested in art.

She was an amateur painter and a collector though she would never have called herself that- calling oneself a collector is a recent thing.   As she ages and slowly vanishes she is a constant reminder of what are life’s priorities; People and one’s loved ones, not things! She loved things too though.

During my childhood I was a witness to her creative process and to her struggles as she was painting. As a result I gained a keen interest in the creative mind. And so here I am on the trail of new artists, new voices, new visions. The African fair is gaining traction, which is great and the prices are going up it looks like; or should I say it felt like that was the case for my latest photographic purchase! Yes, indeed I have bought something already though I am still in New York! I knew the photograph and when I saw it pop up in one of the galleries’ selection I jumped on it.

Bonhams’ has timed two sales of Contemporary African art for the two last weeks of October. The results for the Africa Now sale that took place Thursday October 15 were disappointing. I was not surprised as the quality of the work was generally sub par.

Shortly after, I will be off to Lagos, for the Lagos Photo Festival. It will be my first time to Nigeria and I am looking forward to seeing the local art scene. Nigeria has a burgeoning local collector base and I am really keen to see it in action. It is great that African photography is gaining traction in the Global North but even more necessary is the development of a local African collector base. Hopefully the work will be less oriented to appeal to a foreign audience and truly reflective of a more novel and local aesthetic.

Last year I noticed and bought the work of Nemsa Leuba at the Lagos Festival Booth in JOburg and now she is being shown at the 1:54 Fair. So I look forward to making more discoveries!

Following Prince William’s passionate anti-poaching speech, we look at the disturbing facts behind the poaching spree.

A horn can change hands at £40,000 per kilogram (2.2lb), compared with £33,000 for a kilogram of gold Photo: ALAMY

By Charles Starmer-Smith and Brian Jackman

In the years before the Tusk Trust was established in 1990, poaching was so widespread that elephant populations in many parts of Africa were threatened with extinction. The ivory trade was banned in 1989 yet in the last year poaching levels have returned to those of the 1980s. Black-market prices have risen so high that rhino horn has become more valuable than gold. A horn can change hands at £40,000 per kilogram (2.2lb), compared with £33,000 for a kilogram of gold. With an average horn weighing 7kg and worth nearly half a million dollars, it is little wonder that poachers are willing to risk their lives.

According to the African Wildlife Fund, more than 900 rhinos have been poached across Africa over the past three years. Since the start of this year, 181 rhinos have been killed in South Africa, according to official figures. At Lewa, the Kenyan conservancy where Prince William proposed to Kate Middleton, a rhino was recently lost to poaching – despite the fact the reserve is protected by a 150-strong security force.

Africa’s rhino population today is estimated at 25,000, but if poaching continues at current rates there may be no rhino left in the wild by 2025.

Elephants, too, are being poached at an alarming rate. In February, the Kenya Wildlife Service announced that 278 had been poached last year. It plans to expand Kenya’s elephant population, restoring the animals to areas where they were exterminated in the 1980s. Earlier this week rangers in West Pokot, in Kenya’s Rift Valley, shot dead five suspected ivory poachers, recovering 50kg of elephant tusks. A national park in Cameroon recently lost some 450 elephants – almost its entire population.

Charlie Mayhew, co-founder of the Tusk Trust, says: “This is a battle that we cannot afford to lose. In addition to supporting efforts to protect the animals, we are seeking in collaboration with other conservation groups to address urgently the demand-end of the markets that drive this repulsive trade. We are urging governments in Africa and Asia to bolster their efforts to enforce laws and match the crime with a far greater punishment than many currently deliver.”

According to Traffic, a conservation group that monitors the global trade in animals and plants, a shipment of 128 ivory tusks bound for China was seized in the northern Mozambique port of Pemba last year. The price of raw ivory has risen sharply in the Far East. It is now reported to be worth more than £1,000 a kilogram – cheaper than rhino horn, but still lucrative enough to make poaching and smuggling a dangerous but worthwhile occupation.

Earlier this month, an emergency summit of politicians, wildlife groups, conservationists and NGOs was called in Nairobi to formulate a comprehensive, co-ordinated response to the poaching crisis. Measures were agreed to strengthen rhino surveillance and anti-poaching units and to improve co-ordination of law enforcement at national and regional levels. It was agreed to increase awareness of the issues and to seek to influence policy-makers, financiers and government officials.

Read his article: Out of Adversity, Visions of Life

(note: may need NYTimes registration)

Racial politics of Tuareg nationalism

Tinariwen are a band of Touareg-Berber musicians from the Sahara desert region of Northern Mali. They have performed internationally and their fifth album Tassili won the Award for Best World Music Album in 2011. It was recorded in the rocky desert as you can see in the video.  Tinariwen share their perspective on the events in Northern Mali and offer an alternative perspective. Make sure to read the post and the following comments which provides further insights on the issues.

Tinariwen-speaks-out-on-the-coup-in-mali

I would like to invite you to join me on a walking safari in the Ndoto Mountains of northern Kenya led by the famous Helen Douglas-Dufresne and Pete Isley and their Samburu team. Camels accompany the group carrying gear and supplies. This is a fund raising walk for the benefit of MEAK, a small charitable organization that funds and organizes medical and surgical missions in Kenya and a clinic in the  Ndoto Mountains that I am helping financially and which serves the Samburu people. This is for experienced hikers who can walk 7 hours per day at a slow pace.

The date for the 2012 MEAK fundraising nature walk is set for November 7.  We will gather in Nairobi on November 7^th in the morning to fly up to Waso Rongai, north of the Ndotos where the eye mission is taking place. We will stay two nights there to see the end of the eye mission and then walk for five nights.

We will start to the south side of Mt Nyiru, which is a huge square moutain to the South East of Lake Turkana in Northern Kenya. This is where the Maa speaking people think Ngai ( their god) lives. It is their holy mountain. We will walk south towards the Ndotos across fairly flat zebra country surrounded by mountains to start with and head across a pass in the Ndotos into elephant country walking through beautiful rolling foothills and end in the Milgis lugga.

You can read on my blog a wonderful account of the last walk we did last May in 2011 written by Jane Furse who lives in New York. We usually like to add a little R&R after or perhaps a visit to the Masai Mara. This has yet to be decided.

The last walk was a women only walk, this time we decided to include men. So do come with your husband or partners if you so wish.

Two sets of kidnappings happened last week one in Timbuktu and the other south of the Niger River in Hombori. This makes me realize how lucky we were three weeks ago during our visit to Mali. I don’t mind discomfort and a bit of an edge but killing and kidnapping is altogether something else. In a way I feel privileged to have been able to go North to the Dogon country, get to discover its treasures, and come back safe. It seems it could get a lot worse before it gets better. When I was staying in  Bamako I noticed American military personnel staying at our hotel. They were not wearing fatigues but I recognized the look. Indeed I read a few days later that the US had sent some trucks and other machinery (not troops ) to take up North where trouble was brewing. So a military build-up is under way  in part to deal with the increase of armed Touaregs and other coming back from fighting in Libya. This is such a blow to tourism, and to the Bamako Biennale.  For further information, check these articles online.

http://www.washingtonpost.com/world/europe/witness-says-1-european-tourist-killed-3-others-kidnapped-from-a-timbuktu-restaurant-in-mali/2011/11/25/gIQA0y1vvN_story.html?hpid=z4

http://www.europe1.fr/International/Mali-le-passe-sulfureux-des-otages-833797/