By Dr Tony Monda

A SUPERIOR aesthetic taste came naturally for Africans, when creating our art. The creation of artefacts, art and various cultural paraphernalia were holistic in their values and were created for the greater benefit of the communities as opposed to the individual.
Embedded in this aesthetic were codes, symbols, ideograms which constituted the languages of decorum and identity which were specific to the people for whom the artefacts were made.
Over the decades, since the attainment of their independence, much of the art produced in former colonies is inclined to reflect the lingering residual of the colonial legacy.
Colonial tenets of taste in art were imposed during the periods of colonial education and simultaneously superseded the tastes of indigenous cultures.
Issues of what was, and is, considered aesthetically significant has repeatedly been trivialised, owing to the incompatible and irreconcilable differences between Western Euro-American ideals, world views and those of most indigenous cultures.
Given that any manner of social colonialisation creates cultural conformist pressure, emanating from the machinery and force of the hegemonic centre -problems of acceptance and interpretations of our visual culture will always be spawned for those living and producing art in indigenous cultures.
The art of the African scene will always remain on the periphery of what is termed ‘global art discourse’
A paradigm for inter-cultural relations is how our indigenous traditional communicative values are modified and national uniqueness is distorted or lost in the quest for the creation of a modified artistic aesthetic for the expediency of Euro-American and Western consumption.
Even in later day studies of aesthetics and art history, the demands to alter aesthetic ideals to suit the African is denied due to the deep-seated assumption that art’s historical practice is Western derived, albeit its linear and myopic outlook.
In most African cultures, Zimbabwe included, the focus of contemporary art production for one’s community has given way to the notion of making art for international audiences as early as 1959 (in Zimbabwe).
This development however, has removed the interest of local audiences who today are still coming to grips with trying to comprehend modern Zimbabwean art perceived and presented in a Euro-centric context.
Interrupted by 100 years of colonial subjugation, the process of an organic and holistic development of our visual cultural identity is still being distorted by the adoption of ‘imported’ cultural tastes and values.
In 1959 contemporary Zimbabwean art was given international art market values, derived from an infrastructure and an economy that could afford them at that time, but unaffordable to local audiences.
The cultural forces which generated this development however, are fundamentally different from those that operate locally today in post- independent Zimbabwe, but the damage has been done.
Today, we cannot afford to buy our own artworks.
By embracing occidental values, Zimbabwe and other developing African countries in the region where a thriving mega-politan infrastructure is lacking have inherited colonial problems of not being able to accurately valuate our art, in both monetary and cultural terms in our own context.
These are important values which cannot be ignored, if we wish to re-endow our contemporary art and culture with the dignity and value it deserves.
Suffice to say in most African geo-economic structures, art and culture as a whole are yet to reach post–industrial status.
Africa today is only beginning to revive their industrial bases, following the removal of colonial socio-economic structures.
And as a result, we still have the opportunity to determine our socio-economic and contemporary cultural trajectory for ourselves.
Confronted with the Western modernist and Avant-gardist influx of art today now made easier by the internet, many of the developing African countries have developed a miscellaneous, clichéd approach to their art.
Many have also simulated imported aesthetics and imported information to the point where our art can be seen as blending with current international trends albeit at the expense of indigenous content.
When cultural values are not compatible with the infrastructure of one’s society, a number of problems arise.
Intellectuals, writers, artists and visual artists become increasingly alienated and isolated from their own audiences as is the case in many former African colonies.
As a result, the local indigenous markets are unable to support the products of their artists.
Furthermore, local educational practices are not able to fully educate Zimbabwean artists for the ‘new age cultures’.
Hence, it is important to note that in developing countries, especially those that have previously been colonised, like Zimbabwe, we still need to re-discover and re-invent ourselves aesthetically and culturally, prior to taking part in such world art forums- on an equal footing.
Our direct indigenous link with the past has been broken, episodic or sidetracked by the presence of an imperial sieve and Western winnowing basket, which now employs our own ‘new African Art curators’ – to unfortunately remove our core cultural values and encourage and retain the chaff, basically retaining the empty values promoted by Imperial cultures.
Although many indigenous artists are blessed with an inherent craftsmanship ‘Humhizha’, they are confronted with a scarcity of materials and resources to (enable them) to compete with the high–tech industrial finish, of epic artworks produced in the Euro-American cultural centres.
While we, African artists attempt to produce artworks of what is purported to be of ‘international standards’ we are also affected by material constraints.
Unfortunately Western post-industrial aesthetic taste is currently being embraced, imprudently by many African countries in the developing world, which are still to realise and implement a fully functional industrial economy, let alone re-document and re-research their own cultures.
An anomaly for many a contemporary African artist today, particularly the Zimbabwean artist, is the fact that they are frequently faced, consciously or unconsciously, with an option of how much of their original ethno-centric background should be relinquished for the sake of assimilation into a Western context and acceptance into the hegemonic culture.
Some artists and curators go as far as erasing their roots entirely ,with the objective of blending completely into the new (artistic) environment, (demanded of them) in order to participate in World art forums or exhibitions.
Thus a new criterion of aesthetic taste is being, covertly created by the imperialists, which is not necessarily ours.
However, we are still lucky to have, local artists who are brave and confident, to create their own idiosyncratic paths and maintain a unique strain of their indigenous Zimbabweaness.
The culture of investing in our own artists is still an issue of contention in most African countries and very few post-colonial African artists feel they have succeeded globally until they have been endorsed by Euro-American biennales or ordained by European galleries and their puppet curators and dealers.
Art Consultant, Artist and lecturer Dr. Tony Monda holds a PhD. in Art Theory and Philosophy and a DBA (Doctorate of Business Administration) in Post-Colonial Heritage Studies. He is a writer, art critic, practicing artist and Corporate Image Consultant. For Comments e-mail: tonym.MONDA@gmail.com