Michael Soi’s Love for Nairobi: Inside the Curious World of One Kenya’s Most Controversial Satirical Artists.
Written by Nana Sir Osei.
Kenyan social commentator and artist Michael Soi is satirically documenting the political, social, economic and urban lifestyle in Nairobi with his colourful and catchy paintings. His bold and detailed paintings of half-naked, naked, well dressed women and men, and large portrait images embody his personal reflection of the contemporary lifestyles of people of Nairobi.
Like many African artists who use their works as public broadcast vehicles, and as mirrors to reveal their interpretations and understandings of issues around them, Soi is enthused by the routines of the Kenyan citizenry based in Nairobi where he resides.
“I am motivated by the double standards of Kenyan life,” he admits. “I just love Nairobi to bits. It has so much to talk about as an artist or creative person. I Iove to document the lives of the Kenyan population.”
Michael’s paintings, which are mostly produced from acrylics on paper, look funny and slightly comical and cartoon-ish at first sight. However, underneath the simultaneously oversimplified and exaggerated physical features of his subjects lies a deeper understanding of the complex nuances of public and private social relationships. Each work of art is more than certain to leave his audiences highly engaged in thought, and publicly or mentally deliberating the themes he cheekily addresses. Corruption, socio-political matters, Chinese involvement and interest in Kenyan affairs, the treatment of women sex workers, sex tourism and many other social engagements that he observes in Kenya.
According to Soi, these are the issues that Kenyans do not like to talk about. “I work on all the themes that people don’t want discussed,” he explains. “Commercial sex work, intergenerational love affairs, corruption, lousy governance among many other topics that hinder the social, spiritual and economic growth of an African country.”
In a chat with Afro Art East Africa, Michael said, “through his work, he is making a visual diary of Kenya so that two or three decades from now young Kenyans can get a sense of the Nairobi of today.”
Similar to Ghanaian music duo FOKN BOIS who are also satirically using their music to address social and political issues in Ghana, Soi is challenged by whether his audience agree with the messages beneath the visuals he produces. About the controversy, he says, “At the moment I am just documenting the happenings in Nairobi. I am sure people get my work but it isn’t always accurate to say that they agree with it because a lot of people love the truth but very few people live by it… art is about honesty. It is about telling stories. My stories are influenced by things i see in Nairobi despite the fact that they are stories that people feel that they are best left untold.”
One situation in Africa that has caught attention of many artists on the continent is the increasing number of Chinese people and their involvement in local businesses, and other illegal activities including shallow mining and sale of cheap fake African fabrics. In 2013, Ghanaian artist Serge Attukwei Clottey and his GoLokal performance collective put up an enactment to address the Chinese involvement in Galamsey (a Ghanaian jargon for illegal mining) in Ghana. Michael Soi is another artist who has been critical of the Chinese people in Africa since 2012. However, unlike xenephobia that is rooted in an unfounded disdain for people of a particular ethnic or national background, these critiques raise fears that stem from colonial pasts and corrupt leadership.
According to a paper by the South African Institute of International Affairs (SAIA) on Chinese migration in Africa, it is estimated that there are one million Chinese nationals living in Africa. To Michael, the presence of “China in Africa” has been suspicious from the beginning. He believes the Chinese are only exploiting Africa, and many more believe African governments are both aware and involved in these activities. Thus, the relationship between African countries and Chinese institutions is more symbiotic than mutual. In 2012, he created a series of visual satires titled “China Loves Africa” aimed at interrogating Chinese interests in Africa, Kenya especially.
“This is a body of 40 pieces I created to interrogate the intentions of china with Africa. It is work that is based on conversations around Africa to whether china is helping Africa or helping itself with raw material from Africa.”
Beyond business and infrastructure, the influence and involvement of Chinese institutions in Kenya have seeped into the country’s art industry. Since 2013, Chinese artists have outnumbered Kenyan artists at the Kenyan Pavilion at Venice Biennale. In the said year, only two out of twelve selected artists were Kenyans. In May this year, the Kenyan Pavilion saw another Chinese invasion, even though the Biennale was headed by Nigerian Curator Okwui Enwezor. Yvonne Apiyo Braendle-Amolo was the only Kenyan on the list of seven artists, which included six Chinese artists.
This is a problem many Kenyan artists have individually and jointly protested. According to Michael, “the Kenyan art community went up in arms.”
“I am not an optimist but more of a pessimist. We managed to go to Venice for the Biennale and a report was made on ways and means of having a proper Kenyan pavilion in 2017. We hope this will materialize and have Kenyan artists in our pavilion.”
In response to this, Soi created a four series satirical painting titled, Shame in Venice (seen partially above), to protest against the maltreatment of Kenyan artists at this year’s Venice Biennale. “Shame in Venice was created around the circus that was the Kenyan pavilion at the Venice Biennale. It was me shouting from the top of my voice from a rooftop on the misrepresentation that was taking place in the Biennale. Kenya has excellent artists and a vibrant art scene. I just did not understand what the Chinese were doing in our pavilion,” he stated.
An ardent user of social media, especially Facebook and Instagram, most of Soi’s paintings are first posted on his social media pages where he’s gained a good number of followers over the past year. He believes media is an important platform for artists to share their art with the world, evident in the engagement he receives on these platforms:
“Social media is a great thing. It has made the world very small. It has opened up numerous opportunities to alternative audiences to the work done. Personally, it has created an alternative audience to my work that i share daily on Instagram and Facebook. Used properly it has a lot of benefit to people seeking to show work to a global audience.”
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