Whale bones, corals form beautiful artworks in Lamu

The fourth biennial Lamu Painters Festival took a radical turn this year when its founder and patron Herbert Menzer shifted his sights slightly from embracing not only the more traditional ‘plein air’ (open air) painters but also inviting a number of conceptual and experimental artists, both European and Kenyan.

It didn’t mean that Herbert gave less attention to the more than 20 European figurative artists who had come this year from not just Germany (Herbert’s homeland) and Holland (from where he had seen his first ‘painters festivals’), but also Belarus, Russia and Portugal.

But it did mean that he invited several young conceptual artists to come for a six-week art residency to work on their own innovative projects in Lamu.

“I think Herbert extended our stay [beyond the three weeks others resided in Lamu] because he knew conceptual art projects can take more time to devise,” said Juliana Bastos Oliviera, Portuguese performance artist. Her ‘‘Sound Systems’’ installation at the Lamu Fort amplified everyday sounds of people’s lives out from behind a circular tin can ‘speaker’ made of discarded cans that she had found around the town.

Hers was a great hit among the school children and local art lovers who came for last Friday’s opening of not just the Painters’ Festival but the broader Lamu Art Festival. It was also the other brainchild of Herbert’s who had also conceived and commissioned the book ‘‘Lamu: An Artist’s Impression” which was simultaneously launched (all at Lamu Fort).

The lovely watercolour paintings that filled the book were by the Kenya-based British artist Sophie Walbeoffe with the writing by one of Kenya’s leading writers Errol Tribinski and Julia Smith who also edited the book.

WATCH: Corals form beautiful artworks in Lamu: Interview with Margaretta Wa Gacheru

Whale bone art

Equally thrilling for the school children was the hand-made wooden kaleidoscope created by the dynamic duo of Mark Einsiedel and Felix Jung, two German conceptual artists who took over nearly a quarter of the Fort’s large courtyard presenting pieces of whale bone art and other works crafted from objects found around the island.

Mark and Felix also assembled a Whale Memorial on the beach out of the bones left behind after one whale got beached and died on the sands of Shela. The bones had been collected and the memorial commissioned by Herbert in respect for all the endangered species of the planet.

Other conceptual artists were Eveline van de Griend, a Dutch sculptor who worked closely with Lamu’s leading ‘videka’ artisan Ahmed Yusuf to create incredible pieces using videka techniques and materials.

The others included Ekaterina Mitichkina from Belarus, Svetlana Tiourina from Russia and German artists Hartmut Beier and the renowned sculptor Joachim Sauter who comes to Lamu periodically to continue creating his monumental Maweni coral stone carriers.
The 23 Pplein air artists were also represented at the fort but the vast majority of their exquisite paintings were displayed in their full glory at the Baitil Aman Hotel.

Among those whose beautiful works covered a half dozen hotel walls (curated by Julia Seth-Smith and Camilla McConnell) were veterans like Jurgen “the Duke” Leippert, Sybille Bross, Karin Voogd, Natalia Dik, Diedrik Vermeulen and Piet Groenendjik all of whom had attended previous painters festivals as well as a wide range of newcomers including Rob Jacobs, Frans Bianchi and Robin Akkerman among others.

Paintings from orphanage

In addition to the Europeans, Herbert had also invited a host of outstanding Kenyan artists to paint during the Art Festival which also featured Kenyan musicians assembled by Diamond Beach Hotel’s Rachael Feiler who had organised a musical ‘‘Sunset Sail’’ on five dhows that culminated Saturday night with a dance, live music and pizza party at that hotel.

Meanwhile, all the Kenyans created original artworks that took over almost the whole of the upstairs gallery at the fort. Among them were veterans to Lamu like Nadia Wamunyu, Zihan Kassam and Fitsum Berhe Woldebianos as well as newcomers like Waweru Gichuhi, Peter Ngugi, James Njoroge, Dale Webster, and Boniface Maina whose painting were also up at the Peponi Hotel as part of the Circle Art ‘Pop Up’ Paper show which featured a number of East African artists including David Thuku, El Tayeb, and Yony Waite, co-founder of Nairobi’s renowned Watatu Gallery.

Also on display at the fort were paintings by children from the Anidan Orphanage who have been learning painting techniques from Kenyan artists.