It is October 2017, in Merti, Kenya, a town in the middle of a desert-like landscape where the temperatures average up to 100 degrees under a blistering and relentless sun. Dee Belliere, the founder of MEAK, has gathered a scout, a male nurse and a couple of other volunteers to search for more patients that might need eye care, those that might have been missed at the first round up.

This is happening while at Merti’s hospital the medical team is screening patients and operating on the ones that need surgery. During the week 2652 patients will be screened, 201 cataract operations and 578 teeth extractions will take place. An outstanding success! I am so honored that through my fundraising campaign I was able to participate and help MEAK make such a difference in so many lives.

I am one of the volunteers for that afternoon expedition and we all climb into the truck that will take us North from the town, deeper into the desert. Merti is located in the eastern part of the Isiolo district in Northern Kenya.

During the drive I stand in the truck, and lean out of the window to better take in the azure sky dotted with small white clouds, and the flat sandy barren landscape that unfolds around us. There is very little to look at. There are no exotic leafy tree, nor the ubiquitous acacia tree, no bush or plant and no distant mountain to admire. In the very far distance and only seen with binoculars trees with weaver nests hanging on their branches, like fluffy decorations are possible points of interest.

The emptiness is deceptive however; it is mirage-like. When we stop for a photography moment the emptiness slowly becomes alive.  A tiny spot in the distance is actually moving.  I wait, and as time unfolds and my eyes adjust, the image expands. The dot metamorphoses itself into a human figure . I discern one donkey, then two, then three! I am intensely aware of time, space, and movement. I smile.

I find myself strangely happy! This landscape devoid of seductive luxuriousness feels so freeing. I feel at peace. Maybe it is in this bareness that I can truly be in my own skin, no longer compulsively distracted; Nothing to cling to, to romanticize, or to ruminate about.

I remember ten years ago the first time I felt like that. My then lover and I were driving north to go to Marsabit. We drove in silence, his attention solely focused on the treacherous road and mine on the increasing desert like landscape. We were in synch, I remember feeling. A Kenyan safari guide, farmer and conservationist who thrives on harsh conditions, he could feel I liked the bareness, the starkness and harshness of the land with the occasional herdsman and camels appearing along the road. I have no idea why it felt right perhaps because both of us had so much to let go of: He, a deceased wife, and I, a failed marriage and loss of family life. That stark landscape suited our broken hearts. I have since gravitated towards the North of Kenya during my yearly visits where conditions are harsh and the land can be unforgiving yet so deeply moving.

We did meet a little boy who has one malformed foot and Dee immediately gets on her phone and makes arrangements for him to be seen in Nairobi. She will have to find the money to pay for this.

During this time in Merti I am mostly a witness. I observe the MEAK medical team screening, giving care, doing surgeries and MEAK leadership making plans for the next eye missions. I offer my help where needed. Accompanying us are a photographer, Tom Munro and a video maker in charge of documenting the mission.

We all sleep in the same make shift camp, in the middle of the town and eat at the same table in the mess. The mission is going well, no unexpected complication has cropped up. However something is making me uncomfortable. At each meal the medical team, all black Kenyans, sit together at one end of the table and the rest of us, all white women and men from England or the US sit at the other end. Granted, many (the team and us) are on our cell phones, the team prefers to speak Swahili, and this is not a social occasion, but still I feel uncomfortable with this racial, cultural, and hierarchical divide and distance. I express my discomfort but lethargy prevails on both sides until the video artist starts to interview each member of the medical team and their stories become heard. That is the beginning of a slight change, a relaxation of that distance.

The real shift happens when a snake appears while we are all hanging in the yard. It slithers quietly towards one of the huts where a tent had been erected. I notice it and ring the alarm. Mayhem ensues. Everyone is searching for the snake, first in the hut and tent then in the adjacent huts and tents! I ask: Do snakes go up walls? Can it have really traveled to another hut?

Nobody knows but every one is acting as if there is nothing stopping this snake. The driver refuses to sleep in the doomed hut and decides to sleep in the Land Rover. Some of the female nurses decide to sleep in the bus parked in the yard. All of us are talking to each other, laughing and forgetting our differences, united in our fear of the snake!

By the last day we are sharing stories about dating in different cultures and communities. We have not become best friends but we feel closer, we shared something. We are more ready to sit next to each other and inquire about each other’s lives.

I also watch the comings and goings of the people who live in Merti. They belong to the Borana tribe. I learn that they have more in common with people in Ethiopia then other Kenyan tribes. 99% of the Borana tribe lives in Ethiopia! It sure brings home the craziness of the original partitioning of the region by the Western powers. The people from Merti feel a bit forgotten by the government in Nairobi. Very little government medical funding reaches them and with the endless nurses strike in the country, there is almost no activity in the hospital. They are extremely grateful for MEAK’s medical help.

I discover a peaceful community. It wasn’t always so I am told. Three years ago you could regularly hear gunshots. Today the sounds I hear – crying children, the occasional motorcycle or car passing by, the yellow weavers chirping away, the sounds of goats and obviously the call for prayers, as it is a Muslim town – suggests that times are better. However, the relentless heat and drought are a big strain; during three days of our time there the charity organization Action against Hunger was distributing food to mothers and children. Life is precarious here.

On our last day the community and its dignitaries express their gratitude to all of the team and the elder women of the town sing and dance for us. We all get scarves, tunics and wraps!

Thank you all of you who have helped!

The next day we fold camp and wait for the plane from Tropic Air  to take us further north in the Ndotos mountains where we will hike for the next 7 days. It took us a while to  find the airstrip! Another adventure! Check out my next post for more images of the hike .

I WISH YOU ALL A PEACEFUL, PRODUCTIVE, AND JOYFUL NEW YEAR !

Here are a few photographs  from my walk in the Ndotos in Norther Kenya that made me wonder in front of nature.

My attention during the end of the year 2016 has been focused on the election and post election circus in the USA where I live. At times I fantasize moving away!  Most of the times  I feel it is time to get more involved here where I live and do my bit in “my backyard”.

On the Africa front, the last couple of years I have wondered if some readers may view my postings and my perspective with some skepticism as I am a white woman from New York city with a good knowledge of art but I am not a professional in the field of African art and I am not from African descent.   This did not worry me much when I started the blog as so little was being written about African creativity and I felt that sharing my enthusiasm and encounters could only be positive. I was also quite clear that this blog was a personal undertaking and I often spoke of my experience as I encountered a different artistic approach to the one I was trained  in. I acknowledged my perspective and spoke of how I navigated this difference that at times challenged my preconceived ideas. I loved the challenge, learned a lot from this process and  became a better person for it. I learned to understand and respect and value another person’s perspective and experience  while at the same time standing in my own shoes. More then anything I met wonderful people, shared unforgettable moments and had a lot of fun.

The context has changed today. There are many experts in African contemporary art  based on the African continent or in the diaspora that are doing a fantastic job speaking, and writing about African art.  The word is out: Africa is a continent rich in creative talent.

Going forward, I thought it would be useful to list here several web based platforms that speak of African contemporary  topics such as art and culture, fashion, music, and current events. The emphasis of most of them are on latest trends in creativity in Africa and further illustrate its dynamic quality. Some of the sites are more focused on a young audience and aim to be “cool” , others provide more in depth analysis. Many of them were started about the same time I started my blog which is about 5 years ago with the same intent of changing the conversation around Africa.  Most of the writers are from African descent or based in Africa.  These platforms are a rich source of information and I highly recommend following them.

• Contemporary And (C &)
• Another Africa

These two are the closest to my blog in their focus on art and culture.

• Africa is a country

This platform has a much longer history, a much broader mandate and excellent writing. It’s focus is on writing, media criticism, video and photography.

• TRUEafrica
• OKAYAfrica

These two  have been very successful in reaching a broad young African audience, the fastest growing demographic segment in Africa. They have a content that aims to be “cool”  and covers the new trends in culture, art, music, fashion, sports, politics, tech innovations. They are a bit short in in-depth reporting.

• IAM-Intense

This is the web version of the new art magazine IAM.  It celebrates women in the fields of visual arts, fashion, design, and architecture in Africa ( mostly West Africa).  The bilingual content is directed to readers who speak French or English.

• Lagosphotofestival
• Dynamic Africa

With a singular focus on photography, these two sites provide valuable insight on the new developments in photography and video.

I hope you enjoy perusing them! I will not be posting as  much on this website but you can follow my art adventures and explorations on instagram @isabelshappeningafrica. I have joined the Tate Modern Africa Acquisition committee so expect some good stuff!!!

After my meeting with at ARTLabAFrica with artist Beatrice Wanjiku and David Thuku, I went with  David to check out Kuona Trust which I had heard so much about and where David had a studio space. Set in a green part of town the artists’ studios are housed in long metal sheds/ hangars organized around a central gathering area. Most artists share small studios. Indeed David Thuku shares his space with another artist. I asked him if they got in each other’s way but he said no. They each have their corner. He works mostly from a large table set in the corner of the room.

These are open studios and I found the artists either working away in a variety of mediums – Dennis Muraguri was welding metal for one of his mixed media sculptures – many were painting  or milling around and chatting with each other. It was very informal and congenial. Some had held a studio for close to ten years, others were newcomers. Here artists are mentored, and Kuona Trust provides support, ressources and opportunities to experiment. There are technical workshops taught by senior artists, internships, residencies, and rented studio spaces. Artists sell their work from the studios and often are commissioned work.

Since art and art education sadly were never priorities for the Kenyan government – it was eliminated from the primary schools – and formal art training at the college level only happens at either Kenyatta University or the Buru Buru Institute of art most art teaching happens in workshops. This dates as far back as the 80’s. Kuona Trust is very much a reflection of that collaborative tradition and was instrumental in the development of the model.

Kuona Trust is part of the Triangle Arts Trust, which had been set up by Anthony Caro and Robert Loder in 1982 in England to create networks of artists, visual art organizations and artist led workshops in over 30 countries. It had the mission to  “counterbalance the tendency of the Western art world to put the emphasis on the object and its marketing rather than on the creative process itself.”

“ It was particularly successful in Africa” says Danda Jaroljmek, director of Circle Art Agency. “ It started off in South Africa where there was little connection between black and white artists and then it spread. Artists would go back to their home countries and say: ‘I want to do this as well!’ It was an extraordinary forum, I loved that it was artists doing it. It was not curators or collectors dictating who could get opportunities but it was artists talking to each other.”

Some other workshops worth noting are the Wasanii workshops, which happened during the 1990’s to 2011. In those workshops Kenyan artists would meet artists from around the world. Twenty-five artists – half from the host country half from around the world – would work together for 2 weeks in a remote place. Finally but no less important are the workshops led by the Kuona Trust artists that are held in the local communities where they teach art to the youth.

I liked this feeling of community and exchange. I also like that artists despite the lack of governmental support are out there helping themselves and others and are determined to make art a game changer.

Sadly since I wrote the first draft of this essay things have changed for the worse. Because of budgetary problems and lack of funding Kuona Trust is closing. It is very disappointing news but knowing the resilience and determination of some people in Nairobi I am optimistic that some new platform will take shape.

Beatrice Wanjiku as a female artist breaks away from Kenyan traditional  expectations, in her art and in her life.

The Quintessence of Loneliness III, 2016

Beatrice Wanjiku was born in the Ngong Hills near Nairobi in 1978. She did her art training at the Nairobi’s Buruburu Institute of Fine Arts from which she graduated in 2000. She now lives in Nairobi, Kenya.

Her canvases and works on paper waver between figuration and abstraction and have a rawness that is provocative. Always starting from her personal experience she delves in the human psyche, revealing its struggles as it contends with loss, social dictates and political instability.   Beatrice’s work is visceral, uncompromising, and reflects her personal challenges. Finding her voice has been an arduous process and now that she has found it she is unconcerned with others’ opinion of her work. Indeed sometimes her imagery is hard to look at. She manipulates her paint with an expert hand. The paint stretches, pulls, hides, conceals, reveals, and drips. During my visit to Nairobi this August I had the pleasure of interviewing her. The interview provided important insight into her personal story, her artistic methodology, and her commitment.

State of Existence , Immortality Series, mix media, includes X-rays.

Disquieting Muses, Straight Jacket Series, 2016

Isabel Wilcox: When did you know you liked making art?

Beatrice Wanjiku: I would doodle on walls; my mother used to be very irritated about it. I always had the need to understand how things work. I studied art at the primary level and in high school I dropped history and took art instead. So when I graduated from my high school I knew from inside I wanted to be an artist.

IW: What did it mean for you to be an artist at that stage?

BW: In art school later I was taught the theory of art and art history. The funny thing was that when I graduated I did not know who I was. I learned to do all these things: One paints and it looks like Renaissance or Impressionism. “But who am I as a painter?” I asked myself. For a longtime I used to do traditional subjects like mother and child. It felt familiar. I borrowed from the context of my environment. The context was social. When my mom fell ill, it was then that my work changed. My work lost color. I could not see the beauty in color. The context of my work had totally shifted. My mom was the only parent I had known. My dad died when I was very young. My mom and I were very close. So when she died I felt like someone had pulled a rug under my feet.

I remember during the wake my mother’s family telling me that I had to put on a brave face. So here I was this cheery person, chatting them up. Wakes are funny because people just sit down, have tea, catch up, and share stories and laugh. It is a time of tragedy but everyone is laughing. We buried her and everybody left and I felt the stillness in the house then. I felt like I was almost buried with her. It was just quiet. She was gone. Before that you are so bombarded by everything you don’t have a moment to actually think. And then you know she is not coming back. You don’t know what to do. It is almost as if you lose sight of who you are. Everything I am, my identity is very much attached to her. So who am I without her? So how do you function like this? I started not to care if my work was positively received. That was in 2006.

Prior to that an artist from Belgium and I had done a workshop with people who were HIV positive. When they shared their stories I was shocked. At first I did not understand this whole idea of empathy. There was a divide somewhere. Eventually I opened myself to them. There was so much hope, and fear! I started doing this series of portraits where the resemblance did not matter. I was trying to express the emotions, the things that we hide because I realize that faces become masks. People are not allowed to express what they feel. I realized from that workshop that we are mirrors of each other. I became more open; I had more empathy.

IW: How did that show in your work?

BW: The only way to grieve is through my work. That is how the portraits I made after my mother’s death felt for me. You present this front and people think you are OK but you are not.   I painted the Immortality series, which explore the notion that we may die physically but we are very much alive in the memory of the ones we have left behind. I believe that when we have stopped remembering that person is completely dead. I finished the series in 2009 but in a way it morphed into the next series.

IW: Is that what you are working on now?

Currently I am working on the Straight Jacket series. It is about my identity as a female in a very patriarchal society. I look at the boundaries that are set by society. Being an artist, female, single, everyone is asking me: “when are you getting married?” Being married and having kids is the pinnacle of success especially in an African setting. I am not married, don’t have kids, and work.

My work is very autobiographical. It is my story. When you stop caring how people look at you and at your work, you are freer. I am even surprised at my own work.

IW: How would you describe your creative process?

BW: I mull over something for a very long time. Most of my inspiration comes from something I have read or watched. The image of the straight jacket becomes a metaphor for what I am thinking or feeling at that time. I take note of what I am thinking. I sketch.

I have books on anatomy. There were in my family’s library. My dad wanted to be a doctor. I utilize them. I am very fascinated with how the body works. The flesh, the blood like in the anatomy books. I see it as color and think about how I can put it into my work. I try to use the exposed inside as a metaphor for what is happening to a person. I tend to feel that I can’t be the only person feeling like this. So I try to put it into a universal context.

I love the human form. It is central to my work. After I prepare the canvas I sketch. After that color takes over and I can paint a layer and leave it, just look at it for the whole day, thinking about how I can develop it. I find accidents I can play around with. But I am very deliberate.

IW: What do these dark areas of color that spill over refer to?

BW: The dark shadows…it is something that has been recurrent in all my paintings. I did the Immortality series when my mom died. Everybody moved on I felt like there was a shadow trailing behind me. I could not catch up with people. I felt stuck and people did not understand that. There are things that you never stop mourning.  “For life” I say.

I never use black. It is almost dark purple.

I am very content with my life but the world is not content with who I am because I don’t follow a typical idea of who I should be.

IW: The figure screaming. Is it about rebelling against conventions and expectations? Could it also be that you are struggling with that shadow?

BW: When I speak of shadows it points to my presence in the work. My figures are androgynous, neither male nor female. The Straight Jacket series is about breaking with conformity.

IW: Tell me about your way of painting?

BW:I love the idea of layering, there is much building of color. I want the final color to be so thin that you can see underneath it. In the Straight Jacket series I paint the form first and I paint the reds that denote the internal organs, the chest cavity exposed, like it is almost drooling blood. It is so gory at times. I put the straight jacket on. I put it in such a thin way, but I want it to cover yet one needs to see through it.  Other works are very solid.

IW: What makes you want to do choose transparency over opacity?

BW: I don’t want to be too analytical. Sometimes it feels like an out of body experience. People come to my studio and they are shocked. They ask me if I am ok. It must be something in my unconscious that needs to come out. I do not care if it shocks you. It is there. I have a sense of peace when I look at my paintings. I am mentally exhausted and need to sleep then.

My work takes a long time to develop. I am always thinking about it, taking and adding. I don’t work on a single canvas. I work on multiple canvases. They can look messy. But they will be done. I like the idea of peeling away the skin.

IW: It seems to me that you are very deliberate with the composition.

BW: I am very particular about form. I don’t like constraining my form to the canvas. When you think about ourselves as human beings, we see ourselves as finite. We die but I feel our spirit lives on. You live and grieve beyond the canvas. When I constrain my figures within the canvas I feel like my figures are almost not breathing. I want the viewer to feel this person is living beyond the canvas.

In a new piece I just did there is no straight jacket. I am thinking about our roots, not just the sense of what family we are born into, or where we come from, but how we are brought up with ideals. I find that we are self-consuming. We stand in our own way. It is more about how we think and stand in our own way. At times my work is almost literal. You can see that one figure is devoured by the other.

People ask me why do I decapitate my characters. We are never present in our lives. We are almost mechanical.

I say to people: If you want pretty pictures, I don’t know how to do that anymore. Beauty is so temporary.

There is loneliness when you break the rules of the community.

By wanting ones own path, people shun you people, don’t include you.

It has its costs.

People did not buy my work when I was doing “Renaissance” painting. It had no center. When I did the Immortality series it was shown in a restaurant in Westlands. People bought my work. I was grieving; I found it disturbing. I felt utterly exposed. My work transformed because I spoke of the human condition. I am painting what is very real to me.

IW: Who was your most important influence?

BW: People have referenced Goya, Soutine. I had no idea who Soutine was.

I was so inspired by Richard Kimathi and Justus Kyalo.

IW: While your work is autobiographical, can you tell me what else feeds into it?

BW: My ideas also come from what I see, the special situations like the political one, and what affects me in my environment.

During the post election I did a painting called Point of Entry that spoke about the first time I felt afraid. As human beings we are capable of such extremes. I remember not leaving the house. It felt like house arrest. I lived in apartment block where different tribes lived. The tribes were the issue of the violence. You say to yourself: “How can human beings do stuff like that?” Unconsciously it stays with you and you are haunted by it.

The news was the only entertainment. At some point I had to get out. I got out and drove. There was not a single car or person on the road. It felt like an apocalypse had happened. Yet it was a relief to get out.

Beatrice Wanjiku’s works have been exhibited nationally and internationally. Group exhibitions from 2015  Paper II at Circle Art Gallery in Nairobi; and Guess Who’s Coming to Dinner at Richard Taittinger in New York, USA.

Peterson Kamwathi , a contemporary artist from Kenya had his first solo show in New York City at the Volta art fair in March. ArtLabAfrica had been selected to show Kamwathi latest series “Positions”. This series came about as a reaction to the increasing tension between different religions all over the world which was exacerbated by the Westgate Mall attack in Nairobi by Somali Islamic militants in September 2013. It also feels quite timely taking in considering the current events in Kenya.

His work is rendered in thick layers of charcoal, pastel, watercolor, stencils and more recently collage on thick watercolor paper. While rooted in the figurative tradition it is highly conceptual and addresses social, political and cultural issues. Fascinated by human behavior and daily rituals, in his more recent bodies of work he has turned his critical eye to observing the individual in a group setting: political gatherings, queues, and now group rituals within organized religions.

The structure and anatomy of prayer is at the core of this body of work. Moving away from a more specific rendering of individuality, his static figures are generic, almost abstract set against a background which is either left blank or when densely decorative is void of any vanishing points.  Figures are individually drawn and cut out and then assembled in a group pointing simultaneously to the human vulnerability expressed in the act of prayer and the power found in the collective act of organized prayer.

All too aware of the growing tension between Christianity and Islam locally but also world wide Peterson explores here the similarities in ritualistic positions that transcend difference of opinions, and beliefs. Individuality is subsumed here in favor of the human desire for community, and in this case for surrendering to a spiritual higher power. I liked the body of work and admired Peterson’s courage in engaging with current issues, and endorsed his message of peace and acceptance of differences yet a little voice in my head kept telling me that there was something disturbing to me in these images of group prayer. I could not help thinking of how many atrocities have been committed through out the centuries by deeply religious people who pray a lot!

It is the first time a Kenyan artist has a solo show in New York, and I delayed my departure for my walk in the bush in Kenya to be sure to see the exhibition. I had heard about Kamwathi two years ago when I was in South Africa for the Joburg art fair. While having coffee with Mark Coetze in Cape Town I told him about my particular interest in Kenya and he recommended I try to see Kamwathi the next time I was going to Nairobi.

That November (2012) after a week on a bush walk in the Ndotos mountains in Norther Kenya, a day/night in a hotel room in Lamu feeling sick like a dog, and before getting on my flight back to the US I decided to spend a night in Nairobi and look up Kamwathi. Connecting with him was easy and he gave me an address on the outskirts of the city. That raised some apprehension as I had never ventured on my own in Nairobi to say nothing of beyond!  Once I asked William, a driver the charity MEAK uses when in town, to take me to his studio/house I felt more at ease .

I did not know what to expect. What did an emerging artist studio look like in Nairobi, Kenya? I have visited several spacious, at times factory-like artist studios here in New York but I had a feeling this could be more like my mother’s make shift studios – at one point she made the large entry hall her studio when she lived on her own in Paris.

Finding the house was not easy. After a few wrong turns in a semi-urban area we found the dirt road that led to his house nestled in lush tropical vegetation. Peterson came out to greet me with a huge smile and led me into his studio, a modest space behind his house where he lived with his wife.

I was encouraged to sit down and relax. No art talk was going to happen before he had made me tea!  I was totally unused to this! Instead of him being immediately the focus of attention as is customary in New York he was making me feel the honored guest.
A bit uncomfortable at first I gradually began to relax and let my eyes wander, taking in his life size charcoal drawings in various stages of completion. Peterson’s creative process was there to be witnessed.

A framed print of a massive bull from his Bull series was leaning against the wall next to a starker rendering of a life size sheep. On the opposite wall, a study of figures set in a row emerging out of a cloud of charcoal hung next to a large cardboard covered with small sketches. An oversized cut out figure of a man hung on top of it all. Peterson appears to works surrounded by his ideas, past and present.

While these were powerful images and beautifully executed testifying to Peterson’s artistic talent I admit I was a bit uncomfortable with the animal imagery. I knew it was my Western taste and experience that was getting in the way. Peterson reminded me that cattle and sheep were equivalent to cash in the bank in Kenya and a metaphor for wealth and power. I appreciated then the symbolism and I liked that Peterson was creating works of art with the Kenyan audience in mind and not only an international audience.

Peterson’s work has been increasingly engaged with the historical and current socio-political reality of Kenya and has evolved from a critical gaze on Kenya’s domineering leadership (Bull Series) and passive electorate (Sheep Series) to a full indictment of the government, the role of the media, the police, the electorate commission and the UN   (Sitting Allowance).

Sitting Allowance, includes eight life size pieces – figures arranged in frieze-like fashion stare the audience down – and is the body of work created in response to the violence that followed the general election of 2007-2008 and which propelled him to national and international attention. These works were groundbreaking in the context of Kenya’s visual arts in as much as they were playing, as works of art, an active part in a political discourse and in a societal self-reflection.

As we were looking closely at his subsequent series Queues we started to talk about the prevalence of queues in Kenya: queues of people waiting to vote, queues of people waiting for a seat in a bus or matatus to name a few. At times one can wait close to two hours for one’s turn for a seat, which means it takes forever to get to work! In his drawings Peterson captures the Kenyans in all their diversity. Women carrying babies on their back, or bundles on their head, men in suits or carrying satchels, or jerrycans of water.

Queues are conceptual tools for Kamwathi. In speaking of his 2010-2011 Queues series, he explains his choice of subject matter:

“ Queues are manifestations of events in humanity. They are testaments or monuments to the consequences of events of the past, are the representation of events in the present and they are also clues and signs that point to events that may possibly occur in the future.”

“I am trying to look at channeling, conditioning and manipulation as symbolized in a queue. This is in the area of politics, culture and economics, in both contemporary and historical worlds.”

It was easy talking with Peterson. A gentle, caring and considerate man he seemed most concerned with the lack of arts facilities in Nairobi. A printing machine was desperately needed for art students! Pretty much self-taught, he attributed his mother as having installed his first interest in art after she gave him a watercolor set. He graduated from the Shang Tao media Arts College in 2005 and became well known as a woodblock master printer.

Printmaking and charcoal drawings have been his mediums of choice. His Queues series stylistically reminded me of the graphic work of Mexican muralists and of the work of William Kentridge and he confirmed their influence.

He then pulled out recent drawings from a large portfolio that he went to get from a room in the back of the studio. Made to look like cut outs, these were totally different from the work we had just been discussing. While the subject was still the human figure, it was drawn with a more abstract line, little shading and set against the white of the paper where all sense of place had been removed. I loved the contemporary feel of these works and told him so. We parted soon after that and I felt moved by this experience. It was the first time I had met a talented artist that was deeply humble yet fully committed to his work and ambitious. The combination is a rare occurrence in New York city!

A couple years later it was with great pleasure that I saw his work in London at the art fair 1:54 and I was totally excited that it was in the fashion of the last drawings he had showed me! Perhaps I had an impact, perhaps not but I felt privileged that I had been a witness to his process.

On a less positive note I read on a tweet about the Venice Biennale that there were going to be mostly Chinese artists in the Kenya pavillon!!!! See article  Kamwhati would have been a good choice.

Source

The Guardian

Read more

SUMMARY OF MEAK ACTIVITIES FOR SIX MONTHS TO END OF JUNE 2013

The first six months of 2013 has proved and interesting period for our charity with some very positive aspects to report as well as a couple of set backs.

MEAK has been working in Kenya since 1994 and has been carrying out medical missions since 2001.  We are now recognized as, arguably, one of the most important charities offering free surgery to the poorer elements of the Kenyan population.  One of the problems that have occupied our thoughts for the past few years has been the issue of succession.  Having founded and then run the charity for the last 19 years both Dee and I have been conscious that at some stage we will need to pass the reins on to a younger generation of like minded people.  Happily, we can now see a solution to this problem and several meetings have taken place that will hopefully ensure that MEAK’s valuable contribution to healthcare in that country will be able to continue.

Although neither Dee nor I have any plans to stop working in the immediate future, we have been delighted to have been able to recruit Alexandra Savis to our team.  Alex is an extremely experienced echocardiograph technician who has travelled on a dozen or so of the MEAK heart missions and is passionate about what we do.  She tells us that she is very excited about being more involved with the charity and relishes the challenge of taking over our projects in future years.

Alongside this development, agreement has been reached with our orthopaedic arm, which hitherto operated under the acronym EGHO (Exploring Global Health Opportunities), that the two organizations will fully amalgamate, with the eventuality that the EGHO name will be replaced by MEAK.  This development brings to MEAK an extraordinary organizational and administrative skill-set that has seen EGHO progress from an embryonic idea a few short years ago to the major player it has become in many aspects of healthcare and health education in Kenya.  EGHO is very proactive in training and trauma care and its surgeons undertake many complex and technically difficult orthopaedic procedures during their missions.

During the first six months of 2013, MEAK completed a paediatric heart mission in Mombasa, an orthopaedic mission in Nanyuki, and four outreach eye missions in the remoter areas of Kenya.  Twenty children received open or closed surgery during the heart mission to Mombasa in February.  Twentyfour orthopaedic procedures were carried out in Nanyuki, again during the February mission to that area.  Also, during our four eye missions we screened 3195 people and carried out 209 surgeries mainly cataracts and tarsal plate rotations.  Extensive teaching and mentoring was also carried out by our GRASP-IT trainers during this period.

The above simplifies the bald achievements of the charity in the form of the total of surgical procedures carried out during this time; however, I find that I have great difficulty, when writing these reports, to enumerate the multiplicity and complexity of all the other involvements that occupy our time and energies.  We find that it is almost impossible to confine our attention to the four primary objectives of MEAK ie ophthalmics, orthopaedics, children’s heart surgery and education as there are always myriad other opportunities to help in other areas, many of which are difficult to ignore. These opportunities may be in the form of helping individuals with their medical problems or subsidizing education costs to supporting organizations and groups that have similar aims and objectives as ours.  ‘The Nanyuki–Torbay Health Link Partnership’ is a good example of this kind of cooperation which has enabled us to gain a substantial Government grant to support this element of our work as well as raising the standards of healthcare in Nanyuki – to the obvious satisfaction and delight of the local medics.

I would seek to reassure the reader that the MEAK teams continues to work tirelessly on all sorts of projects in Kenya that match our aims to support and improve the availability of good and safe medicine to the population as a whole.

Rather disappointingly we have been informed by The Mombasa Hospital that after three successful children’s heart surgery missions by MEAK to their hospital, they have decided not to pursue this branch of medicine and accordingly will not be inviting us back.  We are obviously dismayed by this decision, which is apparently on grounds of cost and alleged disruption to theatres and the intensive care unit.  Significant strides had been made by this fine hospital and their staff in the appreciation of the care and rehabilitation of children following open heart surgery and their decision is a terrible blow to MEAK and the PSG group in Mombasa who are constantly looking for ways to save the lives of local children dying from heart disease.  Meantime, we will continue to work in Nairobi whilst we look for another hospital in Mombasa to pick up the baton of this worthwhile and noble enterprise.

In the latter six months of this year we have planned  further heart and orthopaedic missions.  In July we visit Dadaab on the Somali border and in August we return to Turkana in Northern Kenya for a much delayed eye camp. Three further eye trips will take place towards the end of the year.  Most of our missions have comprehensive reports written by the lead participants on their completion and these are available to our readers if required upon request.

Mike Belliere

Founder / Director

M E A K

One thing one learns when being in Africa is never to be rigid when you make plans!

I came to Nairobi  in November of last year. On my way to a fund raising safari walk up North country I arrived with a group of ladies and men at the hotel after a long flight only to find that our rooms had been given to another group that had decided to extend its stay! So adapt we did, grumpily at first because after all it was 11pm! Eventually we all had a fun time even though we had to be bused to another hotel less to our liking.

This time around, in July,  I did not want to spend time in Nairobi, but plans changed and here I was killing time before my flight to Lewa Downs  the next day. I decided to go walk around town, which is something I have never done in any African city. I decided to brave my fears and after being encouraged by a local friend I took off trying to look as inconspicuous as I could. Obviously that was impossible. I was the only white person in the street in midtown Nairobi.

The traffic was heavy and unruly as is often the case in Nairobi, but I managed to not get myself run over when I crossed the street and made my way towards the market area where I was told I would find small shops and mall. Nothing caught my attention, but I sure caught the eye of a few men looking for a shopping victim/tourist. I first rebuffed pleasantly a few who looked suspicious. When I became braver and ready for some “small adventure” I let myself be convinced to venture off the main road by cheerful, and persuasive James Munywoki who wanted to show me his father’s curio store. Perhaps I was reckless but it all turned out to be fun and safe.

In the midst of West and East African masks, and other wooden sculptures I found these quite amusing wooden figurines. Straight out of West Africa (Mali or Benin) they immediately caught my eye. Stiff  but colorful, stylish renditions of white colonialists, their slightly cartoony character appealed to my western sensibility.   When looking at them all grouped together I thought of a crowd of foreign bystanders watching some event like a parade or game of cricket! James and I bargained hard, he walked me to the ATM machine and the next thing I knew James was walking me back to the hotel carrying four figurines under his arm.  When I got home two weeks later I put them in my entry hall across my front door and my daughter told me they were her favorite art pieces.

Two months later I was in Ghana at the Artists Alliance Gallery in Accra and here is what I see! More figurines! I don’t miss a beat and get two more.

Read the next post for more about the arts in Ghana.

I wrote the draft of this blog post before I flew off to Ghana and since then the Nairobi tragedy at the West Gate Mall happened. I consider myself very lucky I had such a day and feel really sad for Kenya and the people who lost their lives.

I love the feeling of the small twin engine plane speeding up the airstrip at Nairobi Wilson airport, the noise that it makes when the engines are on full blast and the following lightness as the plane lifts off the runway. Inevitably a sense of excitement overtakes me.

It’s an old feeling: many years ago I remember taking off the same runway having just arrived from France and on way to Ol Pejeta, a ranch at the foot of Mount Kenya. I felt the same eagerness as the promise of the African bush lay ahead. Today I am on my way to the Milgis just south of the Ndoto Mountains where I am meeting Helen Douglas Dufresne for a three-day stay at Lkanto, her special sanctuary. I get such a thrill sleeping on top of that hill with no cover.

I have been helping fund the costs of the small clinic in Latakwen and I am here to spend some time with Nurse Rita. I have read her medical reports for the last three years and I know  good work is being done. But being a nurse in the bush deep in Samburu land is very different from being a nurse in an urban hospital and I want to see what it entails.

Rita has scheduled a mobile clinic day a good two-hour drive west of Latakwen.  I wake up at daybreak and meet up with her at the clinic. The land cruiser gets packed with all the medical supplies for a day of immunizations and off we go with Francis driving us through the hilly landscape of the Milgis.

It is dry and windy at this time of the year. While clouds hover over the horizon and rain has blessed many rolling hills further to the south, only scattered showers give a little respite.

On the way we stop at Masikita,a village that has grown quite a bit recently because of an influx of migrating herders escaping intertribal altercations in the north.  Villagers and in particular lots of small smiling and eager children gather around the car.  Rita steps out of the car and confers with the elders of the community. Composed and assured she exudes calm and competence; at times when she smiles her face becomes almost girlish.

I love that mixture of equanimity and playfulness. In the midst of daily challenges that dwarf many of my most serious concerns in my life in New York city  I am profoundly touched by her deep love of life and ability to laugh no matter what! I am soon approached by a group of young men, apparently young elders, who speak English. After introducing themselves they ask: “Can you help us find a nurse and pay for her? We have a dispensary but the nurse provided by the government is rarely there.” They have heard that I am the one paying Rita’s salary. They are amazed that someone living so far away from their world is concerned about their welfare while wealthy local Kenyans don’t feel compelled to help. Rita checks on a pregnant young woman who seems to not be feeling well. After checking her for malaria she examines her in her manyatta.

We climb back in the car and after an hour we are driving up a lugga -the local name for dry riverbed – where we encounter a group of women herding a few donkeys and a couple of men sitting under the shade of the acacia trees on the banks of the Masikita lugga at the foot of the Siambu mountains.   It seems that we have arrived at our destination, but where are the patients? I had imagined driving up to a large gathering of patients eagerly waiting for us. I soon learn  that it is not how it works.  Rita confers with the women and it is decided that we are going to set up the clinic on the bank of the lugga under a tree while the word goes out to the various manyattas – hut – in the area.

Rita, Mama Peters, and Esther set up the “clinic” which consists of a weighing contraption attached to a branch, a large container that serves as a desk, and the bend shape of a trunk that becomes a seat. The women then sit down and sip some tea and within a half an hour young women carrying their babies wrapped up in their colorful cloths stroll in with their children in toe. Adorned with multilayered red beaded necklaces their demeanor is strikingly majestic.

Lots of talking ensues, they eventually all sit down in groups and for the next two hours Rita and her team weigh the babies and children, lecture the mothers on health matters and record all findings in a large and unwieldy notebook.

Lots of laughing, talking, especially when the kids get weighed in that strange contraption and without fail scream their heads off. I don’t get a word of what is going on and feel uncomfortable in my outsider observer status. A look of worry does cross the mothers’ faces when it is time to give the shots.  They don’t like their children being hurt and yet they do know that these immunizations have saved many from the deadly effects of measles and whooping cough.  Patience and humor is of the essence.   Two hours of crying babies can drive anyone crazy.  Rita and her team stay focused, unperturbed, keeping their sense of humor while truth be told I do get a bit frazzled by the cries. Fortunately the older children are perfectly behaved and are keenly interested in Rita’s coming and goings.  The babies are given the polio, tetanus, whooping cough, pneumonia and TB vaccines and Vitamin A drops in the mouth.

The women eventually walk away just as casually as they arrived and return to their lives in the bush.  While their world is so far removed from my life in New York city, I can’t help thinking of the many times I sat at the pediatrician waiting for an hour in the waiting room for my babies’ turn to be immunized.

Rita then gives her attention to a group of three young warriors with their hair braided and covered with a reddish clay mixture who want to get tested for AIDS. She pulls out the testing kit, takes blood samples and to their great relief they all test negative! What a surprise when they allow me to take pictures of them. That is a first and I feel privileged. I don’t understand how AIDS can be an issue for these young men in the middle of the bush. Rita tells me AIDS is commonly passed on through open wounds. We pack up pretty satisfied. The day has been productive. Twenty children in total have been attended to.

We drive back stopping here and there to pick up and drop of people, and get back at dusk. The day has been very long and quite tiring for Rita and her team but hugely gratifying for me to see all the good work that is being done as a result of my contribution.

I join Helen and a couple of conservationists around the camp fire while Rita returns to her village where she will be on call and will have to attend to the needs of a young pregnant woman who is not doing well.

This teenager who looks totally dejected is seven months pregnant and it appears she is suffering from preeclampsia and I am concerned that she be taken care of sooner than later. I knew that this was very possibly what she was suffering from having just watched an episode of Downton Abbey where a woman dies of eclampsia after giving birth. (These TV shows can become useful!) Fortunately Rita knows what she is doing.But things are not easy in the bush.  To get good medical help the woman has to be taken to a hospital 5 hours away and her husband says that he has no money to take her there.  I keep bringing the subject up with Helen and Rita, Rita works her magic with the husband, and I find out the next day after landing at my next destination that she has been driven to the hospital in the MEAK land cruiser. I am relieved!

Two days ago I got an email from Helen telling me the woman is doing well and delivered a healthy baby! I was really happy. It is a wonderful feeling to feel like you have made a difference in someone’s life.

It never ends for Rita but she is hugely grateful for her work. Most of all she loves it and it provides for her family – she is the sole provider. She is a grandmother and takes care of her grand child and you can see him running to her at the clinic in the morning, full of excitement and smiles.

Mama Peters is also hugely grateful. She is the sole caregiver to her four nieces and nephews – her sister died and left her with the children.

I ask Rita what she would like to do going forward and what needs to be done. First and foremost the clinic needs electricity! It seems so basic for us but not an easy thing to achieve in the bush.

Rita would also like to develop her midwifery skills and encourage the women to deliver at the clinic instead of in their manyattas. I think it is a super idea and ask her about family planning. I have seen so many babies, small children and unwed mothers that my feeling is that family planning should be a total priority!  I later learn that the population in Kenya has exploded. Thirty years ago Kenya had a population of 6 million.  Today 46 million people live in Kenya!

She also wants to get a certificate to do TPR surgery. Trachoma, which is a potentially blinding and very painful eye condition, is prevalent in the area. Finally she thinks a mobile clinic could be very useful to reach out to the distant manyattas in Samburu territory. There are clearly lots of needs and worthy goals.

Now the challenge is to sort out which ones are the most needed and can be achieved. Funding is obviously the first issue but the follow through and support of the community is also something to take into account.

I think I will start with the most pressing:electricity. A simple scale could do wanders too!