Ro manci n g T he S tone Zimbabwe Thank you to Africanmillennium.com
is the only African country where there is significant sculpting in stone. Elsewhere wood carving is the preferred form of artistic expression. This is original, fine art created entirely by hand. No power tools of any kind are used. Each sculpture exhibited is created out of a single piece of stone. The astonishing range of colour and texture in the sculpture – creating the impression sometimes of different stones that are joined together – is achieved by using different carving techniques, leaving parts of the stone unworked, and by polishing other parts. Many of sculptors rely on hand-made tools, using bits of scrap iron, because they can afford nothing better – although the African Millennium Foundation’s New-for-Old project to replace roughly hewn hand-made tools with efficient, modern, custom-made sculpting tools is slowly changing this. To polish the stone the entire sculpture is first heated by direct immersion in a fire, or by building a fire in an oil drum and wheeling the sculpture around it to distribute the heat evenly. Beeswax or transparent wood wax is applied to those parts that are to be polished, adding layer upon layer using a paint brush. The heated stone sucks in the wax. The next day, when the sculpture has cooled, the waxed parts are buffed to a shine by hand using a soft cloth. The artists explain that polishing always holds an element of surprise for them as it makes vivid the subtle colours deep within the stone. No colouring is added – the variety of colours and patterns in the stone is all natural. There are more than 200 documented types and shades of Zimbabwean stone. The ones used for sculpting range in hardness from about 4/10 to 8/10 – all much harder than what is colloquially known in the Northern hemisphere as Soapstone. The source of these riches is the Great Dyke, a 500km ridge that is 2.5 billion years-old, abounding in mineral wealth of every description, which forms the geological backbone of Zimbabwe. It is the complex combination of these minerals that gives Zimbabwean sculptors an unparalleled array of stone to work with. Most sculptors work outdoors creating and displaying their art in openair studios. Sculpture parks are a favoured way of displaying work for sale and the country’s national galleries all have sculpture parks or courtyards open to natural light. All the sculptures exhibited here are guaranteed to withstand the Northern winter as outdoor pieces. In fact, all African Millennium sculptures come with a full guarantee and an authentication certificate.
AFRICAN MILLENNIUM FOUNDATION PROJECT HISTORY In spite of the success of Zimbabwean stone sculptors internationally, it was obvious to African Millennium Foundation (AMF) that women were hopelessly underrepresented internationally at the top-echelon. This was not because women are inherently less capable or talented than their male colleagues: the problem is making the leap into fulltime sculpting against the inhibiting realities of a patriarchal society and the present harsh conditions.
In the past two years the Foundation curated two traveling international tours titled In Praise of Women: Stone Sculptures Created or Inspired by the Women of Zimbabwe. The 2003 tour opened at Britain’s Oxford University, then moved to the.gallery@oxo, a community-owned space on London’s South Bank. From there, it went to the Botanic Gardens in Copenhagen, Denmark, and the Botanic Gardens in Uppsala, Sweden. The 2004 tour started in Stockholm at Grodan Sergel, and then moved back to the Botanic Gardens in Copenhagen, and then again to the.gallery@oxo in London. There was also a show at the Women’s Art Resource Centre in Toronto, Canada. Both tours were well received by the art critics and drew in excess of 100,000 visitors.
The In Praise of Women project has had an extended run at the.gallery@oxo in London as part of the Africa 05 art programme held in association with the BBC, the British Museum, the Arts Council of England and the South Bank Centre. It then opened for an extended show in Toronto at the Toronto Dominion Bank Tower. African Millennium Foundation AMF hopes to share this enormously successful series in Chicago in 2007. http://www.african-millennium.org
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Over the past three years, African Millennium has hosted In Praise of Women: Stone Sculpture Created or Inspired by the Women of Zimbabwe exhibitions in Oxford, London, Copenhagen, Uppsala, Stockholm and Toronto. The work has been hailed by the art critics and the shows - sculpture – have drawn in excess of 150,000 enthusiastic visitors.
In Praise of Women Series In Praise of Women World Series: Britain: In the very first In Praise of Women exhibition was held in the beautifully manicured gardens of Magdalen College at Oxford University, www.magd.ox.ac.uk . It then travelled to the prestigious the.gallery@oxo on London’s South Bank, www.oxotower.co.uk , to which it returned with fresh and very successful shows for three consecutive summers. This year the same venue hosts An African Odyssey. Canada: The first In Praise of Women exhibition in Toronto, was held at the WARC Gallery, Women’s Art Resource Centre, www.warc.net . Later it was held at the Toronto Dominion Bank Tower, one of Canada’s landmark urban destinations designed by Mies van der Rohe, www.tdcentre.ca . This will be the location for the Canadian leg of this year’s An African Odyssey. Scandinavia: A number of exhibitions were held here, including two outdoor shows at Copenhagen’s Botanical Gardens, www.botanic-garden.ku.dk and a show in The Orangery of Uppsala Botanical Gardens in Sweden, www.botan.uu.se .
Young Woman Sculptor Awards 2004-2005 A national competition for young women sculptors under the age of 45, which in 2005 was held in collaboration with the Zimbabwe National Gallery of Harare and in 2004 with the Alliance Française de Harare. In these two years, the number of juried entrants almost doubled from 28 to 55, with the technical quality of the work and the artistic creativity displayed, improving dramatically. In conjunction with Alliance Française, the Foundation held the first national competition for young women sculptors. The second national competition was held in 2005 at the National Gallery of Zimbabwe, Harare. At the national competition a Young Woman Sculptor is chosen, with substantial cash prizes for winner and runners-up. All the finalists and the merit award winners receive sculpting tools.In 2005 the AMF fellow will be the resident artist at the prestigious Zimbabwe National Gallery, Harare. http://www.african-millennium.org/
AMF Betty Castley Fellowship ‘Promising Young Woman Sculptor’ Created in 2005, partially funding by a Danish supporter antiapartheid activist Betty Castley, it offers similar benefits. Grå Borup-Nielsen met Betty Castley at the Centenary Girl Guide camp at Windsor in 1957. Castley headed the integrated South Africa contingent, Grå Borup-Nielsen was the deputy leader of the Danish contingent. They struck up a friendship that would last almost half a century until Betty’s death in 1992 Betty was a dedicated teacher in the Children’s Burns and Cancer wards of the University Hospital in Cape Town and an implacable foe of apartheid. She resisted the offers of her friend Grå to take refuge in Denmark, saying that if those who opposed apartheid left, things would go from bad to worse. Betty Castley had family ties with Zimbabwe and it is in memory of her commitment to a non-racial society and intenational co-operation that this 2005 award is made, through the generosity of Grå Borup-Nielsen in Denmark.
2006 Gallery: Over the past four years, African Millennium has collected a number of very strong anchor pieces for each show. These are powerful artworks by some of the best Zimbabwean artists, and are often the largest works on
Dominic Benhura Modern Misses Currently on public display at the Open University, Milton Keynes Campus,
Agnes Nyanhongo Princess Lazarus Takawira Pangolin Girl
Locardia Ndandarika Beauty Contest Opal
AMF UK Offices: 8 Beacon House 67 Hemstal Road London NW6 2AG Tel/Fax: +44 207
Dominic Benhura
149 Trematon Drive Morningside Durban 4001 KwaZulu Natal Tel: +27-31 303 56 00/1/2 Fax: +27-31 303
Viper Sniper Springstone &
Currently on public display at the Open University, Milton Keynes
Richard Mupumha - Back Bending Beauty Springstone Grace Mukomberanwa Guardian of Elvis Mamvura Winnowing
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