Mount Kenya Point Lenana

Life is defined by many, many things, but mostly those moments that challenge us and reveal our mettle, summiting Mount Kenya is top most my greatest accomplishment. 

I embarked on a journey to summit Lenana peak Mount Kenya, the highest mountain in Kenya, second highest highest in Africa, after Kilimanjaro on Saturday 9th 2022. We accessed it using the Naro Moru trail a tough trail due to its steep ascend to make camp overnight at Naro Moru River Lodge/Teleki Lodge to make the final ascend the following morning. The hike is scenic with lolling clouds sweeping over the mountains, giant lobelias and moorland. 

View from the summit 16,355 ft Above Sea Level

View from the descend

I had previously done a day hike to Mackinder’s camp having started at 10.30 am and summiting at 2.30pm, four hours. Which I would imagine is quite a great start considering the altitude changes and elevation of 4300 meters or 14200 feet above sea level. As I arrived at Mackinder’s camp one of the  hikers we were with, remarked that it was just 6km to the Lenana peak summit a 500 meter gain in elevation. I recall looking back and thinking had I come prepared, I would have summited the very next day. Let’s just call this sentiment, an over estimation we were high from the mountain air. Hiking Mount Kenya is a fete that people prepare for, doing altitude hikes at many Kenyan altitude ranges. So having summited Mackinders, the rush of finishing, the feeling that one is unstoppable; turning back and heading home I was resolved to conquer this mountain.

This is me hunched over just a few meters to the summit, struggling to breathe, my heart palpitating so loud at his point I didn't think summiting was a possibility. It felt like my body was giving up on me. However much I wanted to proceed I couldn't breathe had to breathe through both my nose and mouth. I stood at this point for a good ten minutes until my heart rate became regular.

A mountain conquered, a victory realised!

The day arrived, we set out for Mackinder’s camp at 1:30pm and arrived before 6pm. The hike up the mountain scenic, we stopped every so often to take pictures and to just take in the sights. The weather was very favourable no rain, hail or snow, but nothing prepared me for the freezing winds. When we set out for the mountain, we had left the porters behind and with them our food rations and among them was our cook for the night. So you can imagine having arrived at Mackinder’s everyone was a bit famished there was not a hot meal and it was soon a dying of the light as the night set in. We asked if a fire could be lit but apparently due the thin air and the smoke from the firewood would apparently be poisonous. I think the whole idea of camping at Teleki lodge is so that the body can acclimatize during the night. 

Giant lobelias 

Waking up at 1:30am for a light breakfast we departed for peak Lenana, a 6km ascend with an elevation gain of 500 meters at 3am with nothing but our torches illuminating the way. The skies clear, stars visible, and the trail of torches lighting the way as we made our way up the mountain. Silence enveloped us save for the grunts and strained breathing as the altitude assaulted our senses; all around us the only sound audible was that of our feet as we made our ascend. The ascend gruelling and brutal, freezing winds, stopping for a minute or two for some reprieve to catch our breathe and  acclimatise to the altitude. The air thin an assault on my lungs as I struggle with my laboured breathing, my heart palpitates so loud but we trudge on until we reach the Austrian camp and rest a bit before we make the final ascend which as estimated by the guide will take us another hour. At this point my fingers, toes and mouth are numb talking is impossible and when I make an attempt it feels like I had a visit to the dentist words come out jumbled. 

We make the summit at 6am in time to view the sunrise four hours later; four hours is relatively the distance one covers walking 15km on a normal trail. Words fail in describing having succeeded to summit, but as the saying goes, “what goes up must come down”, and that was another challenge in on itself. All that mattered is that I conquered Mount Kenya!

The temperature dropping to freezing degrees, let me just say that no amount of preparation prepares you for how cold it got at night. The views though are incomparable! 

Studio News!

Happy belated new year!

I know, I know, like really? Yes. The year is still new though we carry on our days with the responsibilities of the old one. Fresh thought and new ideas growing off the previous both literally and metaphorically, finishing up projects and starting new ones. I have resumed and are back in the the studio after a small hiatus having had a dynamic year that left me feeling burnt out and in need of some rest, I am back, rejuvenated, and refreshed excited to update you and let you in on some studio news;

The year is off to an exciting start; I will be exhibiting at the Expo Chicago with Montague Contemporary. The International Exposition of Contemporary & Modern Art, that features leading international galleries alongside the highest quality platform for contemporary art and culture.

In 2022, EXPO CHICAGO will host the 9th edition in-person exposition on April 7-10, 2022

Restless in rest IV (2020)

On 26 May - 3 July 2022,  I have an upcoming group show with Duende Art Projects dubbed, “Unsettled” at Zwartzusters monastery, Antwerp, Belgium 

Unsettled” is an ode to restlessness. What are humans if not always striving to become a better version of themselves? Restless souls who are invariably moving, stretching themselves – and thereby others - in an active pursuit for impalpable aspirations. This continuous chase can go hand in hand with a passionate desire to express this unsettled state. 

Work in progress  (2022)

Season's Greetings!

I know I haven’t posted for a minute save for updating on art and studio matters. But where else do I get to postulate and ruminate on my life. Let me take this moment to wish everyone happy holidays! The end of the year is nigh; 2022 looms over the horizon, and as always, it’s time to reflect the year that was.Taking stock of lessons learned, opportunities seized, failed states of being, growth, and an all-round illusion of some semblance of order. I woke up saying I need to name five things that I’m grateful for each day. Just five. There’s something about naming them that not only makes one thankful but also one gets to pause and really think. In that way it becomes a way of appreciating even the most mundane moments. While it is easy to define our lives by what we do, these times have proven that is no longer a viable option. Reflections are very illuminating calling to mind my shortcomings and failings. These reflections allow me to appreciate beyond my work, circles of support that I have around me. Family and friendships not necessarily the one you’re born into but those whom we have adopted and have remained true through adversity, joy, at this journey we call life. 

(When not in the studio you'll find me outdoors hiking the trails)

I ushered this year uncertain of what it might entail, after the year that was 2020 a year plagued by a pandemic which by the way is still ongoing that utterly shuffled the way we do life. By this I mean the illusion that we somehow had a semblance of control on our lives. One thing I was certain of, was not to fall back to habits that were both time consuming and unproductive. I had to narrow down what exactly it is I wanted to achieve by the close of the year. I confess I am not one of those people who always ushers a new year with a plethora of resolutions, I mean it might work for some but for me every new year is an opportunity to complete ongoing projects or the completion of set goals. That way I am not fooling myself and I can realise my projects and find balance in both my work and personal life.

(The studio)

As we come to the close of the year gratitude rings in my mind. I’m grateful for mistakes I’ve made and they are many but more the lessons learned. I’m grateful for my solo show that was three years in the making amidst the times we are living in. Collaborated on a VR project that got selected for the Labiennale de Venezia, exhibited at the museum, was part of the tusk lion trail, a global project that aimed to highlight the ongoing threats to the survival of the lion population in Africa. Even with all these projects and more it is astonishing to discover I have a penchant to complain. Realizing I am, my own worst critic, I hope to eschew moving forward from this proclivity. I hope to remedy this by taking a moment to appreciate it all. This year with its wins and losses where sometimes the losses seems to engulf everything. Grief. What is grief? But a part of life. I buried many people this year. I mourned and yet there didn’t seem to be an end to the mourning. Grief hit different having lost an uncle who was like an adoptive father to me, it was one of those moments. Grief coming in unexpectedly, as I accepted the seasons of my heart with its infinite depths boundless and measureless. I grieved failed relations mourning the possibilities I hoped they would be. We continue to mourn for ourselves, the self we are constantly shedding.

(A Wild infection of a Wildly Shaken Public Mind, Solo Exhibition 2021)

Every end of the year this ruminations culminate in not carrying this baggage into the new year. Hoping to arrive at it with optimism. The remedy for this, gratitude. Gratitude even if the mundane moments feel so trivial making them more worth celebrating. So, as we enter the holiday season, I reflect on all those who don’t get to celebrate it for one reason or another. Whether we are alone or with the family we’re born into or adopted, the best way to celebrate the holidays is to be at peace with oneself within the spaces we find ourselves in. The seasons mantra, “peace and goodwill” to all men resounds most times goodwill barely hanging by a thread. Peace within ourselves allows the goodwill to spread to our loved ones. So, while we celebrate this festive season, I hope that everyone wherever we are, are loved and are loving in a small way and are able to extend friendship and love by paying it forward. These times that call for little moments shared between some grilled meat, the buffet, the loud laughter at the family table while my eyes scan across the room at faces I haven’t seen in a while sometimes since we ushered the year; this tradition where we gather for the holidays, each holiday we seem to be fewer and fewer at the table or when we come together for a funeral or impromptu gathering. This manner of getting together for those fleeting moments we engage and try to fit a whole year into conversations. Loud animated conversations where it feels like everyone is talking over everyone at the same time, music humming in the background and when everything has quieted down, we come to an understanding and are understood in whatever we are trying to say. Everyone somehow hearing and being heard; or sometimes we’re sitting on the couch completely stuffed and while you’re in a food coma and can barely remember the conversations a thought flashes across your mind catching you off guard that you laugh with reckless abandon in contentment. 

                                     

(Behind the Scenes IL Dubbio A VR Project 2021)

Wherever we find ourselves, let the most minutiae in the sounds of laughter, running footsteps, fading echoes of conversations in this festive season be the guiding light ushering us into a new year. Because who are we save for these fleeting moments that we so often take for granted. I wish you all love and when the curtain unveils the dawn of the new year, I hope to find you all on the other side.

Happy holidays!

Artworlds Podcast

https://artworlds-podcast.net/podcast/episode-3-beatrice-wanjiku/

https://www.artsy.net/artist/beatrice-wanjiku

In Other News...

https://www.elle.com/it/magazine/storie-di-donne/a38023227/artiste-per-africa/ 

Excerpt of A Review

Beatrice goes straight to the core of our being, bypassing the superficialities and diving into the common features of being human, like bones, blood, veins and other guts. She has a way of striping her subjects down, literally to the bare bones so one has little choice but to journey with her into those interior parts.

She has taken us into those mental interiors in her previous shows. But often I’d felt I was heading towards a ‘heart of darkness’ where some inner sadness was revealed through her art. 

But there’s a radical shift in the artist’s perspective in this show that she entitles “A Wild Infection of the  Wildly Shaken Public Mind.” to continue reflecting on the deeper challenges of being human. Only now, there is far more brightness, hope, and possibility in her art. 

Restless in Rest X 2021

In her show, there is one feature of the human form that repeats itself in multiple iterations. (Someone suggested her repeated forms reminded them of Monet’s multiple beach scenes which he painted and repaints at all hours of day and night.) And that is the ribcage. I find that an apt metaphor since Beatrice seems to be dealing with a delicate subject, namely, what it means to be safe and secure in these times of COVID. Yet in a brief interview with the artist at her show’s opening, Beatrice said she began this body of work well before COVID-19 hit the world stage. “I began this series in 2018,” she confessed. 

The ribcage itself is a protected zone, a brilliant structure designed to protect precious organs like the lungs, heart, and liver from events that could ‘shake the public mind’. “For me, human bodies are a metaphor for mental frames of reference,” says Beatrice whose art seems to have a larger, more universal message. It is that irrespective of one’s skin, facial features, body size, or gender, the human condition is one that is shared by all. Working with darkened hues, especially shades of black and dark blue. But now, she also includes works where the brightness of her hues literally explode on her canvas. And as those explosions take place in works where pelvic bones are prominent, I had to ask what that light source was meant to signify?

Recalled to life II 2021

“It’s about re-birth,” Beatrice says simply. “It’s also about hope and new possibilities,” she adds. With that major hint in mind, I begin to reevaluate my views of all her paintings. All have dazzling moments of brightness, be they yellow, bright orange, blood red or even white.The blood red might suggest violence, but for Beatrice, it would seem that the colour affirms renewed life, energy, and power. 

She has a unique way of looking at the anatomy of the mind. For instance, in one painting, what appears to be positioned like a womb, is painted in blacks and blues. But Beatrice explains that all the growth inside the womb goes on in darkness, waiting for the time to be right, and a new being is born. But that’s another phase, another painting. So when she says her work is about journeying in life, Beatrice is reclaiming a life of hope and rebirth, when darkness is only a bridge to something brighter and more full of possibility.

Excerpt Written for the Business Daily (published 3 September 2021) by Margaretta Wa Gacheru

Currently At The Redhill Gallery

The exhibition currently showing at the Redhill Art Gallery until 31 October, shows work from their collection from two Exhibitions, “Divine Discontent” (2015) and “Mourning a Memory” (2018).

In “Divine Discontent” (A Straitjacket Series), The premise of the work is that, “People believe in certain ways, predetermined manners often according to pre-described norms of society. Anything counter to this is normally punished whereas “normalcy” is encouraged and rewarded.

In the series the “Strait Jacket” is a recurring motif, a metaphor, exploring boundaries, the idea of boundaries (social and self) and imposed system of thought. The work examines how we are anchored by social conditioning and expectation, always bound at the expense of what we desire, a reflection of an outward expression of our inner and intimate existence.

Resume your Flesh and Form V (2018🔴

“Mourning A Memory” (2018) was/is an examination  of a time in decline and our in/ability to compartmentalize our lives, how we change/evolve and are forced to adapt in order to navigate our social spaces.  Informed by social, political situations happening both locally and globally the series was an interrogation of our lives and as an estrangement and reinventing of self.

The similarity in the work is the constancy of the gaze that is repeatedly directed inward, an excavation of the soul to better understand ourselves and the spaces we occupy 

Featured work:

Resume your flesh and Form V(2018)

Acrylic/Pastel/Mixed Media on Canvas

150cm x 100cm