By Dr Tony Monda

THERE is an indispensable obligation for other indigenous businesses, corporations and citizens to participate in, preserve and protect their art and cultural patrimony.
The themes of the artworks at the Zimbabwe Heritage Exhibition 2014, reveals the mindset of our society; endorsing our sense of self, our sense of freedom and our sense of being.
The works are produced in various art media ranging from painting, sculpture, graphics, drawings, prints and photo-collages.
Coming to the fore in this exhibition are the works of young mid-career artists who contrive to create art by devising new ways of expressing themselves using discarded industrial objects to create very telling imagery regarding our society.
The coveted First Prize won by Tawanda Takura entitled, ‘Unfinished Thoughts’ comprises rubbers, tyres, shoes, shoe soles bound with strands of wire to represent a bowing headless man.
The work is anatomically accurate and strangely reminiscent of the many vagabonds seen on the streets of Harare today.
Julius Mushambadope’s ‘Kuvhumbamirwa Nerima’ (Shrouded in Darkness) exposes the dark world of the occult and ritual dances practised in many peri-urban sub-cults.
His work which is both engaging and foreboding, won the Second Prize in the exhibition.
His paintings exhibit bizarre and colourful imagery of people and supernatural animistic beings, drawing on a medley of folk legends and cult symbolism in a surreal vein.
Mushambadope’s other work entitled ‘Kumuzi’ evokes the spectacle of spectres, and Nyau dancers.
The painting depicts Malawian immigrant Nyau dancers who provided much of the farm labour force in the past.
The Third Prize was won by Richard Mudarikisi for his work entitled ‘8 O’clock News’; a painting that re-interprets the crucifixion of Jesus Christ in a new light.
Here, the fourth estate: SABC, ZTV and BBC news crews attempt to interview the dying Christ.
In the background is an anonymous crowd of on-lookers.
His use of yellow, olive green and red as a background colour scheme allegorically alludes to the colours of the Zimbabwean flag.
A new intuitive artist Muneushe Mupandawana presents a hanging wooden sculpture entitled, ‘Hombarume’ (the Supreme Hunter); a leather thronged hunter’s scabbard, carved in wood with spears and armoury encased within – an excellent example of how traditional African cultural material and legend can be preserved in contemporary art.
A new signature, Boarding Dzinotizei, presents an artwork entitled, ‘Song from Within’.
It is a photo-realist pastel painting of a school choir chanting in unison.
It is a well composed and technically sublime work of art.
Several veteran Zimbabwean artists also take part in the current national exhibition competition.
Senior artist, John Kotze presents a bird’s eye view of indigenous strains of maize as a patterned study of colour and texture.
Chibage, his mosaic of maize cobs is a painting rendered in the Superrealism style of the 1960s.
Here banal, static subject matter is reproduced with minute exactitude and a high finish.
This life-size facsimile of maize makes a vibrant tapestry of colour.
His other work entitled, ‘Marata’ depicts an edging of corrugated metal sheeting against blue the skies in Mbare.
In this photo-realist work the flirtation of light and colour in patches of ochre, blues and silvers give lustre to the canvas in which reflection and refraction of light tricks the eye.
Art lecturer, Charles Kamangwana, known for his socio-documentary paintings surprises the audiences with an adorable deutschund ‘Dog’ crafted in metal; minimally composed with found metal objects.
Artist, James Jali’s painting entitled ‘Copacabana Rank’ depicts an aerial view of the chaotic parking of commuter omnibuses in the city.
His use of colour and compositional skills brings an order of form and colour to his art work.
Surprisingly, Zimbabwean contemporary stone sculptures are under-represented in this exhibition.
The few stone sculptures are from Tonderayi Mashaya with ‘Circles of Life’, Victor Fire’s Cubist ‘Headman’ and Gideon Gomo’s ‘Tsoka’ which are larger-than-life works, where the emphasis is on skill rather than content.
Gomo endows his stone art with an unusual pliancy uncommon in stone sculpture.
The use and types of material displayed in the exhibition are an indication of what is available and what is lacking in terms of artists’ materials, and how the artists have overcome this deficiency through sheer creativity.
Some of the artists who have qualified in the exhibition are encouragingly younger which bodes well for the future of the visual art in the country.
The Heritage Exhibition 2014 revealed that art and cultural education is a grave concern and issue of contention in Zimbabwe.
The Government’s education and cultural section of the Ministry needs to strongly re-examine art training in the country, especially in institutions of higher learning such as Chinhoyi University and the various polytechnics where most of the instructors and lecturers are not practising artists themselves and their knowledge of art is revealingly limited.
Zimbabwe’s economic development today requires the further development and use of human creative capabilities in all spheres of the economic productive strata. Art development, scholarship, and art patronage should become a major component of the overall socio-economic development of Zimbabwe.
It is imperative to recognise the vital role that art plays in weaving together the framework of our collective consciousness.
Dr Tony Monda holds a PhD. in Art Theory and Philosophy and a Doctorate in Business Administration (DBA) in Post-Colonial Art and Heritage Studies. He studied law and photography at the Corcoran School of Art, Washington and holds a Law and Art Diploma from Georgetown University, Washington DC. He worked with the Washington Area Lawyers Association (WALA). He is an author, art critic, art consultant and a practicing visual artist. He is also a musician, and Corporate Image Consultant.