'Bead king' Sanaa Gateja on upcycling, art as a social enterprise
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Loading... - Glory Selemani
- 18 Feb 2022
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Contemporary multi-disciplinary designer Sanaa Gateja also known as the 'The Bead King' is currently holding an eight-week solo exhibition titled 'Radical Care' at the Afriart Gallery in Industrial Area, in Kampala. The show features 23 new works, 17 two-dimensional works and six sculptures all produced in 2021.
The exhibition will run to close March 26 and all the works on show have been influenced by Gateja’s experience of the Covid-19 pandemic and features a collection of artworks by the women that he also trains in bead work.
“My exhibition marks two years of the pandemic and the changes it brought in people lives as well as innovation. As an artist, I realised how important it is to care for humanity, the environment and a shift in our spiritual responsibilities, hence the title Radical Care,” Gateja told The EastAfrican, in an interview.
Gateja is an artist, painter and jewellery but it is his signature adaptation of recycled waste materials, particularly his pioneering fashioning of beads from discarded paper, which has earned him the nickname ‘The Bead King.’
Some of his acclaimed works are an intricate combination of installation, tapestry and sculpture, which reference to traditional weaving and stitching. He is heavily influenced by the potters, blacksmiths and basket weavers of his childhood village.
He also works with barkcloth, paper, raffia, beads, wood, cowhorn, sisal and banana fibre to construct large artworks as social commentary on nature and materialism which is central in his work.
The self-taught visual artist owns a workshop in Lubowa in Wakiso District where the beads are made by rolling any paper, thick, thin, coloured, plain, old or new or into bead size or by pulping paper and fashioning into sculpture, round beads or new handmade paper.
“All this is not done by me but the people I employ to work with me at every stage of the process. It is a community value addition process. The process is long and involves cutting, rolling, treating, weaving and then the art.” He says he can make beads from rocks, banana fiber and paper.
He hopes that the public will get and learn from the message behind Radical Care for people to change their attitudes for the sake of posterity and the environment.
For example, the piece Blossoming, made of paper beads on hand-woven raffia addresses the issue of the older generation passing on knowledge to a young generation and the future looking brighter for both people and their environment.
Being a social commentator, the piece Namuwongo, The Urban Series — made of hard paper on bark cloth — is about the artist’s concern for city planning (or lack thereof), human congestion, uncontrolled settlements and slum proliferation in Kampala that have grown organically and do not coincide with social services and amenities.
In Early Days 1, 2 and 3 — all made of paper beads and bark cloth on hand-woven raffia — he is addressing teenage pregnancy and early motherhood as an effect of the pandemic and the lockdowns.
“I was influenced by the need to overcome the pandemic seeing how many of our children who were out of school were facing exploitation and unwanted pregnancies,’’ he said. Read More…
