An exhibition by veteran visual artist Peter Masina, who specialises in sculpture and youthful Cris Taulo, started on Monday at the country’s rich and historical haven – La Caverna Gallery in Blantyre.
Meeting the two artists on a Tuesday morning on the second day of the exhibition, Masina, the old wine and the principal act and Taulo, the new wine, were busy attending to their works, which will be home to La Caverna for a week.
Masina has for years showed his sculptural genius in making sculptures that are unique and at the same time telling different stories but this time around – he is exhibiting broken sculptures that communicate volumes of the destruction that Cyclone Freddy caused to the communities in the Southern Region.
“We just want through this exhibition to tell the world how Cyclone Freddy impacted us artists. As artists, we were impacted in so many areas psychologically, mentally, physically and financially.
“For instance, there was no market, people were confined in their homes and that meant no customers,” Masina said, showing one of the pieces focusing on ‘Regretting About Our Action’ and ‘The Lost Family’.
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Taulo using charcoal to sketch drawings one of them named ‘Broken Pieces’, he said he is showing the loss of tools by artists due to cyclone.
“Through using charcoal to draw, I just want to show that we have lost our tools but we can still move on to use other locally available materials to create pieces. I have used charcoal and soil in these drawings,” he said.
The exhibition that follows in the tracks of two other exhibitions of Nyangu Chodola and Moment Chaweza, which took place recently, is featuring a number of sculptures telling stories of the effects of Cyclone Freddy which did not spare the creative industry.
La Caverna’s Director Lois Losacco said the exhibition themed ‘Cyclone Freddy’s Impact on Artists and Community’, was their continuation with a new model of exhibiting the works of Malawian artists “where they get to book space at La Caverna”.
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“So they do their own and installation and the gallery take no fee. We want the artists to interact more with the community and access new clients as well,” Losacco said.
“So, when Peter Masina had booked a space in the La Caverna ground, he was unable to come for the reason that during Cyclone Freddy his studio was destroyed along with the works that he had prepared to display and so, we discussed options with that came the idea for him to exhibit and tell the story of the effects of the cyclone,” she said.
She said on top of Masina’s workings, they also had to bring in Taulo, with an opportunity of doing some sketching’s on the walls of the historical building and bring home the impact and significance of the weather changes “that are occurring not just in Malawi but around the world particularly our neighbours in Mozambique and Madagascar”.
“We should be supporting each other in difficult and good times, La Caverna has always enjoyed the support of local artists, business community etc and hence we would like to invite residents, children and students to visit the gallery not only during this exhibition but to sample artist’s works both past and present that are in the gallery,” Losacco said.
