Kioko Mwitiki, an art gallery director and renowned wildlife sculptor. PHOTO | DIANA NGILA
Bill Clinton has one of his artworks. So did late Israeli prime
minister Shimon Peres, the King and Queen of Sweden and former German
Chancellor Gerhard Schröder.
Some of his wildlife sculptures stand at Jomo Kenyatta International Airport and State House in Nairobi.
Kioko
Mwitiki found fame and fortune in recycling metals and making
sculptures. Now he is one of the top 35 renowned wildlife artists in the
world.
He has a gallery in Lavington, Nairobi, where he also features and mentors upcoming artists.
This is where JACKSON BIKO met him for a tête-à-tête.
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How does one get to make art that lands in Bill Clinton’s hands?
(Chuckle)
I wish I knew the answer to that question. When I was in Kenyatta
University studying fine art, I was caught up in the famous 1980s
Mwakenya student unrest. About 70 of us were thrown out of university
for one year. As punishment for getting involved in the strike, my
sister sent me to work in a metal factory to be taught hard labour. That
was her version of the Russian Gulag.
I was taken to a
welding factory in Nakuru as an apprentice welder. During my lunch
breaks, through my boredom, I would weld things together. One day some
guy came and saw what I was doing and asked whether I could sell it to
him. The rest is history. (Laughs) Oh, and I went back to the university
and finished my degree in fine art.
I don’t suppose it was easy, was it?
Of
course not. I taught fine art for a bit, then got into the jua kali
sector. I got a studio in Kawangware. Most people didn’t understand why I
was making the things I was making, they would call me “that guy who
makes childish things.”
Why do some talented artists make it and others are never discovered?
There
is God and chance, yes, but also real talent no matter how far down
it’s buried, it will ooze out. When people relate to how an artist is
expressing himself, it's easier for that artist to make it. It has to be
authentic. I grew up in Kajiado and in the 60s, there was a lot of
wildlife. When I started making wildebeests and lions sculptures, I was
making them from a place of reference, not from a pathological sort of
vet doctor school of drawing.
Are there people who are going to die with beautiful art in them?
Yes.
It's terrible. They will die with beautiful art in their souls,
beautiful poetry, it's so deep that sometimes you don't want to express
it. There are people who look at art and see it for what it is, and
that’s deep.
How do you think parents who want
more traditional careers for their children should handle them when
they want to pursue art that the parents feel will not make them fit in
the competitive career world?
Some of the best
art schools like Yale School of Art are scaling down their departments.
They've realised that most artists are coming to do degrees in fine art
just to authenticate that they were in that university. When they
leave, they do nothing. Or the art they do is so embarrassing to the
school.
Your child can go where you want him to but
the soul knows what the soul wants. Also, diversity in society is
brought about by having different people of different genres, different
calibres and of different creative persuasions. Our society is so rigid
and so focused on creating perfection and that's a problem.
What was your breakthrough? What happened that you thought, I’m on a different path with this thing?
That's
a good question. When I did an exhibition that went through East
Africa. It was called the “Land Mine Project of 1994.” It was sponsored
by International Committee of the Red Cross. The late Diana, the
Princess of Wales was the patron. My art was to travel the whole of
Africa to show how the war had affected Africans.
How do you know how to price your work? What makes a particular sculpture more expensive than the other?
When
you've been in art for a long time, especially at my level, my work
starts giving itself a price. I had an art auction in 2011, a fundraiser
for Jane Nguro who was an authority of souls in gorillas. I put up a
gorilla sculpture for auction and it went for Sh3.6 million. I want to
imagine that was the most highly paid art in Kenya, at that point. I
didn't realise that my work had become valuable but that was a pointer.
So your work will tell you how to price it at a certain point.
For
a long time, art has been taken for granted. People don't really
realise that art is really central to life and it has a value. So it
must be charged per hour and per size of a sculpture. I teach and I'm a
consultant, I charge per hour. I do art appraisals. I have the
knowledge, the skills, I have been to so many art galleries around the
world. I have dealt with art dealers. So there comes the value. Artists
should not be shy to value their work but they do need somebody to guide
them, especially the young artists.
You have an LGBT flag in your gallery. What does it say?
It's
a rainbow society so we have to be inclusive to all kinds of people.
Our society is going through a transformative stage and it's important
especially in the creative space that we allow inclusivity. We don't
want to leave anybody on the road because of gender.
Young artists now have access to the Internet. They have a friend in Tokyo or Islamabad. Their heads have a lot of different ideas and perceptions of life. These are the minds that we want to capture because they are very different from us. They talk through their painting.
Young artists now have access to the Internet. They have a friend in Tokyo or Islamabad. Their heads have a lot of different ideas and perceptions of life. These are the minds that we want to capture because they are very different from us. They talk through their painting.
You are now 55, what’s the next phase of your art going to capture?
The
more I spend time with these young people, the more I see the cultural
void in Kenya. I want to try and fill that void because the museums have
failed us to be honest.
How old are the children?
My
kids are 25, 21, and 18. My wife is a business woman. My son is into
digital art and my young daughter is into theatre performance.
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