The voyage recorder

Dumisani Ncube | Friday November 20, 2015 15:16

 

The Thapong Visual Arts resident artist specialises on –ears.

The artist’s work is mostly based on landscape and wildlife that she usually sees during those long safari  trips. “Due to my art work I travel very often so that I get more inspiration to work on new staff. I want to penetrate to more adventurous areas across the globe so I get more experience”.

In one of her striking pieces which she says it’s one of her first artworks is a Masai child with traditional beads and necklaces. “Well, I did this trying to show how African children are portrayed.”

However, she noted that her work was also driven by her emotions and how she felt during the trip or when she was working on the artwork.

Tsumake plays around with natural substances on her artwork to add more life and reality to it. This was seen on a baby crocodile artwork she did when she toured Maun.

The painting was of a baby crocodile coming out from the eggshell that was surrounded by mud. The interesting part is that Tsumake used real mud on the painting, “using real substance adds more weight to your work”.

Her artwork has been pleasing to the extent that some of it is on display at the National Museum.

Tsumake, who said she learnt a lot from renowned painter, Wilson Ngoni, mentioned that as a voyage painter, her local market was not good.

“Most of my clients are from outside the country. They buy more compared to the local market,” she said.

Her works range from P1,000 to P 2,500, but she is satisfied with the amount of revenue she gets from selling the artworks as she manages to survive. She also believes that for one to fully penetrate the arts industry, you have to network and be well-connected.

Apart from being a travel artist, she also works on human portraits, especially when one places an order. At the time of the interview with Arts and Culture, she was drawing for a couple that recently got engaged. “A client of mine recently got engaged and he asked me to make a drawing of this,”  she said, showing us a picture of the couple.

The artist believes she has not reached her peak and she plans on going to school of art next year.  Tsumake has been into art from a tender age, starting from her early school days. And that’s where most of the inspiration came from.

She decided to take the professional route after high school when she became part of the Thapong Visual Arts resident artists.