Hwati takes art to another level MASIMBA HWATI
MASIMBA HWATI

MASIMBA HWATI

Stephen Garan’anga Visual Art
“Quantumlogik” sounds very unorthodox in the world of fine art creativity. It tends to both mind and tongue twist and in the art fraternity it will not be surprising to hear many grumbling about why not leaving words of such to the physicists or rocket scientists.
Following this concept is Masimba Hwati with his fascination with high quality found objects that possess discreet quantity of energy proportional in magnitude to particular frequency of radiation and corresponding for example to a photon or to a transition of an atom between energy states.

This time around it’s not only his appreciation of the objects but his psyche that he defined as thinking integrated manner. He said it is a shift from linear rationale by adopting a higher level of resourcefulness and innovation.

In such a process all ideas and possibilities are considered as resources towards solutions, event whose ideas which seem irreconcilable.
He said this is the most effective approach to thinking in solving today’s pan African problems.

In his statement Masimba said “the work presented focuses on the aspect of quantum thinking as a culture that is keen on connections and common denominators amongst diverse phenomena.

Our colonial and post-colonial zeitgeist has provided fragmented paradigms that have incubated and produced most of our urban sub-cultures.

These cultures create challenges that demand use of multi-disciplinary toolbox which contains both traditional paradigms, current and technological ones.

This reminds us of Shona proverbs “chengaose manhanga hapana risina mhodzi” (pay attention to all types of pumpkins because all of them contain seed) and also “chara chimwe hachitswanyi inda” (one finger cannot crush a louse). One explores the principles of creative synthesis: integrating traditional knowledge into new systems and transformation of knowledge; exploring the social media juggernaut inter-relates with traditional knowledge and culture.

The intention is to create dialogue and explore the kaleidoscopic and generic nature of knowledge. Interesting to note is the interconnecting of culture, technology, habitats and habitus’ thus removing the proverbial pause button from culture.

In our times traditional icons and paraphernalia are juxtaposed in subtle ways with socio-urban and mainstream symbolism creating subcultures and alternative trajectories. In this process new totems and new gods emerge.

One explores these ethereal relationships and hopes to demystify the sacred irony of rural and urban spaces that emanate from a disintegrated approach. It is this fragmented approach that divides and labels habitats into separate entities so we end up having a rural culture and an urban one as well as high, low and medium density community cultures existing concurrently in a volatile social setting.

One explores urban rituals and their place and significance in the modern day metropolis. Our contemporary pan-African world therefore becomes a complex anthropological organism that engenders a lot of questions on the connections and moral denominators that characterise our habitats”.

Since Hwati began his professional visual art career he has been synonymous with his unlimited skills that enable him to create all sorts with master precision from embroidery, tailoring, being a cobbler, a blacksmith, a ceramist to mention a few. He has been creating fabulous intricate three dimensional art pieces and all that is still intact.

But this time he has also revealed his other concealed underutilised media of expression in ink drawings and graffiti on both small and large scale on road signs, panels of wood and huge paper. He also screen-printed on navy blue denim material a series of 28 pieces that he called “Urban Totem”.

The screen-prints sized 50 by 37 centimetres are of male portraiture of different postures wearing sunglasses with lenses bearing embroidery logos of giant international companies with services that we may be stranded without especially in our urban internet life.

The logos vary from the Whatsapp, Kentucky Fried Chicken, Google plus, Twitter, Facebook, Apple, Yahoo, Amstel Lager to mention a few.

Masimba says he is an interrogator of post colonial hangover cultures with definitions that delineate contemporary African and Zimbabwean art forms.

His work is being directed towards becoming a search and a suggestive mould and antidote for some of technological and ideological challenges that face post modernistic African and it this particular case Zimbabwe.

Since the beginning of the millennium Masimba Hwati has engaged himself in a pennant like pilgrimage, not to use culturally sublet material in his work.

This has advanced his work towards a direction of continuous search of new material and ideologies that define contemporary Zimbabwean art. In this move Masimba has forsaken painting on canvas and this has brought about radical disengagement from conventional patterns of art.

Currently as a lecturer at the Harare Polytechnic he has seen positive developments from his students following this principle. His teaching has been characterised by traits that seek to push culturally complacent ideas, from being consumerist to being solution hunting landmarks.

In this show Masimba’s three dimensional artworks is dominated by the manipulation of hardwood panels of shapes and sizes and the wide use of metal bits of “mbira” musical instrument to create instruments of his own.

Some of the work in the show include “Trepanation”, “Hybrid”, “Guitar”, “Juggernaut”, “White Shield”, “Zoomorphic Deck”, “Tears”, “Sun”, “Harare Thinking” series to mention a few.

In some way this body of work is a bit simplified and mature to what we had been accustomed to.

One wonders what his next offering would be. The show “Quantumlogik” will shut down its doors to the public in mid-November 2014.

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