By Dr Tony Monda

It is vital to take the pulse of the visual arts and heritage each year.
This is usually undertaken by the diverse articles I have dispatched on various aspects of the state of the arts in Zimbabwe.
The modus operandi of The Patriot’s art pages is to take stock of the state of the visual arts to enable Zimbabwe to record, re-design and develop a sustainable cultural road map for the future of our visual arts and heritage.
Furthermore, the columns address and articulate ideas regarding the profession that bolster the viability and human potential of the human arts, while re-discovering and reclaiming our heritage from an Afro-centred perspective.
In my articles I address socio-cultural issues pertaining to Zimbabwe, including but not limited to architecture,archaeology, economic, legal, pecuniary, religious, educational, gender, technical, colonial and other historical and current aspects of visual arts in the country.
The various short discourses also included the notions of post-colonial African aesthetics, identity and the trajectory of the Zimbabwean visual arts in relation to the rest of the world.
The articles are intended to highlight our cultural deficiencies and to strengthen our identity to help maintain a healthy heartbeat in the visual arts, culture and heritage. The crux of the articles is to build sustainable human and institutional capacity for the arts and to create a body of knowledge that articulates our Zimbabwean story.
A further objective is to create and foster an inter-face between society, government and academia, the business sector, legal, health and tourism sectors with the arts providing the fulcrum that anchors development in general and in the process build a viable and visible art sector for the artists and country.
Awareness and appreciation of the visual arts grew noticeably since 2010; a fact which could largely be attributed to the increase in electronic and print media coverage as more local journalists have taken to covering the arts in Zimbabwe.
However, the standard of arts reportage and criticism in Zimbabwe falls far short of regional, let alone international standards. Zimbabwe has the least knowledgeable and specialist-educated art journalists and critics in Africa. Much needs to be done to redress this anomaly.
The print media is an important visible channel for public education in the visual arts and culture, which is why I have chosen it as a podium for public discourse on the arts for the preceding three decades.
In 2015, I covered aspects concerning the visual arts in my discourse, analysis and critiques on the state of the visual arts in Zimbabwe.
I began in January (issue 184), with the second installment on architecture in which I examined the politics of space and the racist separatist architecture in colonised African countries with an article entitled “Colonial Urban Architecture – understanding the politics of race, space”.
The reclamation of our heritage was covered in an article Arts and Archaeology – Digging into the past (issue 185), in which I examined the need to preserve, protect, rehabilitate and reconstruct our historical sites and national monuments.
A feature titled Africa’s masterpieces must be returned (issue 219) tackled restitution which examined ways in which Zimbabwe and other African countries could retrieve the stewardship of their art and cultural treasures, such as the Zimbabwe Birds, Mapungubwe Golden Rhinoceri, golden nuggets, ancient coinage and currencies from the Munhumutapa Dynasties.
Colonial plundering of Africa’s treasures by European museums was further tackled in an article entitled Europe wants to cling to looted artefacts where European countries are advocating for retentionist patrimony of African treasures.
In March I looked at public art in the city and the art of Adam Madebe. At the beginning of April I examined the resilience of the mbira as an instrument which encapsulates our ancient, modern and future histories.
In a three-part series in August on the Horrors of Chibondo, I advocated for the importance of war museums to record the liberation struggle of Zimbabwe from pre-colonial times to 1980 and beyond. Such a museum would not only safeguard our memory of the struggle, but would provide employment for suitably qualified personnel, serve as a Chimurenga archive and garner a new form of cultural exchange based on military museum tourism.
In March and September I examined gender in articles covering works of Semina Mpofu entitled Defying odds in a man’s world, and Gender from an African perspective in stone sculpture, which highlighted the works of Zimbabwe’s women sculptors since independence in 1980.
The thorny topic of the abuse of intellectual property and copyright law pertaining to the indigenous visual arts was also discussed. The protection of the artists from piracy, especially on the internet was brought to light in an article entitled An African-centered approach to intellectual property in art and heritage.
The article emphasised the need for proper legislation to be tabled and enforced under the Zimbabwe Intellectual Property mandate.
In October and November I examined the moralisation of the liberation struggle through art as a repository of images of our struggles. This was brought to light in an article entitled, reliving the memories of the struggle through art – part 1 and part 2.
The issue of Zimbabwe’s participation at “Venice 2015” was covered in an article entitled, who pulls the strings, in which I took umbrage at the arts administration in Zimbabwe for their bigoted and sexist selection of artists and their continuing obsequious kow-towing of Western cultural agendas by Africa’s curators and arts administrators.
Most of my articles engendered the need for a reconnection with African sensibilities and the re-orientation of the African self, and the re-discovery of evidence of indigenous cultural achievements through the Zimbabwean Shona sculptor’s biographies in which I covered the works of John Takawira, Lazarus Takawira, Nicholas Mukomberanwa, Henri Munyaradzi, Bernard Matemera, Joseph Ndandarika, Fanizani Akuda, Albert Mamvura, Sylvester Mubayi, Richard Mteki and Brighton Sango.
Artworks, architecture and visual cultural material are condensed records of our civilisation and heritage. They reveal and record ideas, philosophies, histories and the socio-cultural values held by our society.
It is hoped that these articles and their relevant discourses will help to bring visibility, education and the re-awakening of our arts and culture in the context of the international world and trigger an enhanced capacity for the art and culture fields to better develop in Zimbabwe. Have a blessed 2016.
Dr. Tony Monda holds a PhD. in Art Theory and Philosophy and a DBA (Doctorate in Business Administration) and Post-Colonial Heritage Studies. He is a writer, musician, art critic, practicing artist and Corporate Image Consultant. He is also a specialist Art Consultant, Post-Colonial Scholar, Zimbabwean Socio-Economic analyst and researcher.
E-mail: tonym.MONDA@gmail.com