Africa-Press – Malawi. Beautiful paintings as well as a sip-and-paint assignment for patrons underscored the beauty of visual art at the three-day Art in the Park event which ended yesterday at Four Seasons in Lilongwe.
For a long time, visual art has played second fiddle to other artistic disciplines but it called the shots during the biannual Art in the Park, which is a platform that gives visual artists a chance to showcase works. About 40 up-and-coming and established artists displayed pieces at the event, which ran under the theme ‘Community’.
The opening on Friday night by European Union (EU) Ambassador Rune Skinnebach was colourful and spiced up by performances from, among others, Nkhata Bay-based reggae artist Michael Mountain, who, on his acoustic set, did not skip his track titled ‘How Beautiful is the Lake’ and Cynthia Phiri.
“We have seen amazing paintings tonight and as EU we are happy to partner Wildlife Environmental Society of Malawi (Wesm) to provide opportunities for Malawian artists to display their artistic talents,” Skinnebach said.
Director of Arts in the Department of Arts in the Ministry of Tourism, Culture and Wildlife Humphrey Mpondaminga, who represented the minister, described Art in the Park as one of the outstanding arts festivals.
“The festival has been consistent; it is unique because of its focus on visual arts and above all, it is the only festival that is held twice a year,” Mpondaminga said. Wesm Chairperson Nick Hall hailed Art in the Park organisers for promoting creativity in the country.
“We believe that we are going in the right direction and all the events are always different. We, as Wesm, also try to promote natural resources conservation and artists have played their part by creating artworks tackling such an issue,” Hall said.
Some artists sold artworks, mostly to people from other countries, while Evelyn Chisambiro excited people with her sip-and-paint product on the second day.
Lawi closed the curtain on the second day, with people enjoying his vibes. Earlier on, there were performances from poet Wanga, contortionist Shando and sansi player Patrick Chimbewa, among others.
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