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Rufaro Murenza and his piece ‘Mwana Wedangwe’

Tawanda Marwizi Arts Correspondent
Award-winning sculptor Rufaro Murenza believes women have important roles to play in the society and should be given opportunities to show their prowess.

In this regard the sculptor’s works put in light the plight of women, urging the society to empower women and address issues that affect them.

For him women were created in a special way that the society should appreciate.

Recently Murenza bagged the National Arts Merit Awards accolade for Outstanding Dimentional Work with his “Mwana Wedangwe” sculpture.

The piece shows a mother and her first daughter.

“I have done this piece to show how women are important. I am happy that it managed to get recognition by winning at the recent National Arts Merit Awards,” he said.

He said when he started his career in 1996 he had no place to work from.

“I started my career in 1996 but during those days I had nowhere to work from,” he said.

To make matters worse he had difficulties in getting the stones and to transport them to his place.

“During that time I gave up because of these challenges and I saw sculpting as one of the most difficult art disciplines,” he added.

Though he later worked hard and sailed through Murenza says a lot still has to be done to promote sculptors.

“Though there are notable improvements in the industry, there is a lot that we still need to improve,” he said

“I can see that authorities are concerned with copyright in music only but we have a similar challenge as sculptors,” he said. He said when one artist works over time to come up with a definitive piece, some copycats then quickly churn out mass replicas. “We don’t grow as artists because we will be doing one and the same thing,” he said.

The 35-year old sculptor said he would continue fight for the empowerment of women. He said it is the role of artistes to educate the nation about issues that affect woman among them Gender Based Violence.