Rikki Wemega-Kwawu
“ The thoughts of my people: their philosophies, sensibilities and values, their mode of worship, that which they believe in and which guides their day-to-day living.
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You can find more information about Rikki’ s work on www. facebook. com- Rikki Wemega-Kwawu
An interview with
Rikki Wemega-Kwawu
Art around us
Fishing boats, Adinkra, durbars and phone cards are just some of the inspiration Takoradi artist Rikki Wemega-Kwawu draws from everyday life and the people around him.
His work features in collections around the world with one of his most recent commissions being a set of works for the prestigious new Movenpick Ambassador Hotel in Accra.
Growing up in Sekondi-Takoradi, Rikki says he enjoyed painting from an early age and, as he puts it,“ bugged my parents to buy me watercolours”. When other boys were busy playing football he and a group of friends painted together.
Later, at high school, Rikki decided to apply for engineering schools in the United States, thinking that it might be possible there to gain an engineering qualification while also pursuing his art interests. When application forms called for information about the applicant’ s extracurricular activities he would send off a couple of paintings with the form to show where his interests lay. Staff at one school in Illinois were so taken with his work they displayed it on their walls where it caught the eye of African-American art dealer Ronnel Walton. So impressed was he that he contacted Rikki directly and sent him three suitcases of art supplies, some of which he still uses today. Walton then visited Takoradi himself bringing more supplies and suggested that Rikki should take up a position as an art teacher at a private school in America.
Visa problems put paid to both that idea and engineering studies but, passionate as he was about art, Rikki decided to educate himself. He visited libraries all over Ghana reading extensively about art, history and philosophy through which he realized that many world-renown artists, Picasso to name but one, never completed formal art studies. From then on he made painting his life’ s work and over the years has developed an international following. In 1998 he was accepted into an advanced course at the prestigious Skowhegan School of Painting and Sculpture in Maine, USA, an honour usually only bestowed on those with post-graduate academic qualifications in art. Working in oil, acrylic and sometimes in other media Rikki is equally comfortable in abstract or pictorial methods.“ My realistic works are characterized by humanistic tendencies. I am stimulated by life around me; people, landscapes, figure in landscape and natural forms. I capture the rhythm, heartbeat and passion of my people: their joys, their sufferings, their moods, their aspirations and their destinies. I am very much interested in the activity of light in three dimensional space and how best to render such imagery in a two dimensional painting”.
In his abstract works he says he tries to find visual imagery to deal with the magicomystical realities of the African spiritual and religious world.“ The thoughts of my people: their philosophies, sensibilities and values, their mode of worship, that which they believe in and which guides their dayto-day living. As a painter, it is incumbent upon me to make known the thoughts of my people, to portray the lasting manifold spirit of Africa. I am seeking, therefore, an art of spiritual regeneration, to try to get to Africa, show how it is experienced and felt in totality. My work invariably, has something to say in search of a modern visual expression of religious meaning”.
In 2007, Rikki assembled around 4000 used pre-paid mobile phone cards in an installation titled, Kente for the Space Age. The cards came from various countries including, Malaysia, the United States and the United Kingdom, though most were from Ghana. They were woven together with plastic twine in a syncopated rhythm, mimicking the vibrant colours and compositional design of the traditional Ghanaian kente cloth. The work has displayed to much critical acclaim in major exhibitions in the UK, USA, South Africa, The Netherlands and Germany.
Rikki is keenly interested in Adinkra and other African writing systems and has incorporated this widely in his work. A key influence in this area has been the Swiss psychoanalyst, Carl G. Jung, and his idea of the Common Unconscious or Universal Mind which connects us all no matter where we come from. As Rikki puts it,“ A person from Germany responds to an Adinkra even if they have no understanding of the metaphor it portrays which a Ghanaian can read. Symbols and art can speak to us all no matter what our different languages or cultural heritage are”.
“ Royal Umbrellas”, 2010, Acrylic on Canvas
“ Ashanti Saga”, 2005, Oil on Canvas
“ Kente for the Space Age”, 2007( detail), Used phone cards and plastic twine
“ Drum Appellation”, 2005, Acrylic on Canvas
“ Just One Day”, 2003, Oil on Canvas
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