#Harambee63

#Harambee63

#Harambee63 – An Installation about African Revolutions and Ordinary People

The exhibition calls into questions ideas we hold about our individual roles and capacities in times where bravery and action is required. All so-called revolutionaries are ordinary people but these ordinary people changed the world. By taking something as ordinary as gumboots, which have a history in war, I would like to show that we all have the capacity to change the world even as we are ordinary. I want to focus on Africa because it is considered the “hopeless” continent yet, ordinary people with ordinary means brought about independence. In the same way, ordinary people are also locked in cyclical wars. There is little distance between a guerrilla soldier and a student for example.

#Harambee63 will raise questions about whom we consider revolutionaries touching on Africa’s vast history from Gandhi and Shaka to modern day “heroes.”

Exhibition premiers in September 5th 2013 at the Kuona Trust.

#Harambee63 – The Hashtag

As I have been collecting data for the subjects for the pieces, I have found a lot about our continent, that I believe we need to know especially in this period of time as we Kenyans begin to place our independence in the greater global fight for “Coloured” people’s rights. The recent ruling on the “Mau Mau” compensation case, opens a new chapter on the recognition of violations against “coloured” people by former colonial nations.

For Kenya, I would like the discussion to delve into the layers of colonialism and post colonialism. We need to find the faces that are part of our history in order to understand it.

Follow #Harambee63 on Twitter and Storify and on FB; like the page Harambee63

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#Harambee63 enjoyed good coverage and I am grateful for the people who wrote about their experience of the installation. Thank you.

The Star, September 11th 2013: The Ordinary Kenyan’s Role in African Revolutions

Africa Review, September 11th 2013: Revolution Brewed in a Seedy Kenyan Bar

Business Daily, September 12th 2013 : Artist celebrates Kenya at 50 with conceptual art installation in a bar

Daily Nation, September 13th 2013: Reliving Kenyan life before 1963 through a bar scene

Daily Nation, September 28th 2013: African liberation struggle through the eyes of an artist

Ebru News, September 27th 2013: Harambee 63 by Wambui Kamiru

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