(air whooshing) - Africa. One of the fastest growing
regions in the world. The youngest continent, where six in every 10 people are under 25, with hundreds of different ethnicities and some 2000 languages, Africa is the most culturally
diverse place on earth. I'm Afua Hirsch. I've been lucky enough
to work across Africa as a journalist. And now I'm exploring Africa's history, through its extraordinary
creativity and culture. I'm looking at how three
very different countries, Ethiopia, Senegal, and Kenya, emerged from the shadow of
empire in the 20th century, and are thriving in the 21st. These African countries, are
reasserting their identity, gaining new recognition for their role as cultural powerhouses. I am interested in how that's happened and how the struggles for
liberation in the past, have helped shape today's
African Renaissance. (traditional music) In this episode, Kenya, a country created barely a century ago. - [Joseph] Where we are standing here, was the birth place for Kenya nation. - [Afua] Where the British
spun an idealized stereotype, while carving out a brutal empire. - [Tayiana] And in the works camp, the detainees would make bricks. - So they were being forced
to build their own prison. - Exactly. - [Afua] Where independence
created new heroes and icons. (upbeat folk music) - And an exciting collision of cultures, finding creative ways
to respond to the past. - As an artist, I think the time for painting beautiful flowers is over. - Kenya has come to
symbolize the idea of Africa for so many people. But there is so much more to culture here. So many divergent traditions united by a unique political history, and by a complicated relationship with the land itself. (singing in foreign language) - [Afua] Here's a vision,
that we in the west, tend to think of, as quintessentially Africa. (singing in foreign language) The Northern Kenya's Great
Rift Valley, the Samburu, an ethnic minority, who are a branch of the
cattle herding Maasai people, use their bodies, as a
vivid artistic canvas. (upbeat traditional music) The Samburu are semi nomadic. And so their art is portable. A projection of identity and status, that moves through the landscape. Animal blood, tree sap, clays, ash, the very materials and dyes, the Samburu use in their body art, are rooted in an almost
symbiotic relationship with their cattle and the land. (chanting) (in foreign language) The Samburu are always passing through, Kenya's imposing landscape. They see themselves as tenants here. But others saw the romantic vastness and wanted to be owners. For centuries, the Kenyan
coast witnessed the arrival of adventurers, explorers,
missionaries, and slavers, all vying for power. But nobody actually tried to plant a flag. It was the arrival of the British, at the height of their imperial project, who would change all that overnight. The year, was 1885. The European heads of state, had gathered at the Berlin conference, to put some order, on the
so-called scramble for Africa. Secretly, and without
consulting any Africans, they divided up this vast continent, into spheres of influence. With the stroke of a pen. The East Africa protectorate, threw together indigenous cultures, farming peoples like the
Kikuyu, Kamba and Giriama, fishing people like the Luo, and semi nomads such as
the Maasai and Samburu, in a new country commonly known as Kenya, in the British sphere. The first big British project, a 600 mile railway, snaking
inland from the coast, to open up Central Africa to trade, to transport colonial officials,
troops, and resources. (train hooting) This was more than just a railway. This was a piece of strategic power play, so audacious, so costly, that at the time, it hardly seemed possible. More than any other single event, this railway, established
British control over the land and created the state of Kenya, setting this country on a path, from which there'd be no turning back. (train hooting) Work began in 1896, but
disaster immediately struck. Dozens of the Indian workers brought over to build the
railway, were eaten by lions. British MPS, outraged by
the costs and excesses, nicknamed the project, the lunatic line. (tense music) Four workers died for each mile of railway that was constructed. This was a hugely costly project. One which mostly, British people, didn't have to make the sacrifice for. So Charles Elliott, the commissioner who presided
over the project, quipped, it is not uncommon for a
country to create a railway, but it is uncommon for a
railway to create a country. (train engine roaring) But not everyone was thrilled by the creation of the new country. (singing in foreign language) Some Kenyans found ingenious ways to unite and resist the encroaching power. (singing in foreign) (whistle trilling) (glasses clinking) This is the kifudu dance, being performed today, to keep alive the memory
of Mekatilili wa Menza. A resistance fighter against British rule. Mekatilili inspires contemporary artists and her people to this day. Mekatilili was from the Giriama people, who lived predominantly
along Kenya's coast. A widow, she had lost brothers
to the Arab slave trade and was suspicious when in 1913, the British tried to recruit Giriama men, into work in plantations or the army. - [Joseph] One day, there
was a public meeting, where we are standing here. The British administrative officer then, Arthur Champion, came
here, with his translator, he was called, Wanja wa Mugaya. - [Afua] When you say here you
mean right here on this spot. - Just where we are standing. Yeah on this spot we're standing. Arthur Champion said, I want your boys to join the British army. And she told Wanja wa
Mugaya the interpreter, can you tell your boss, to take one of those siblings of that hen. He walked there, and
took one of those chicks, and you can imagine, the mother hen reacted very furiously. And he took his pistol
and killed the mother hen. Mekatilili also understood,
what that meant. And she slapped Arthur
Champion to the ground. - [Afua] She slapped. - Yeah. Physically, physically slapping. And Arthur Champion went down. - And this is a man
who's armed with a gun. - Yes. So what did they do? One of them just pulled the trigger and killed one of the Giriama. (drums booming) When he did that, the war started. - [Afua] Mekatilili
traveled across the country to galvanize a resistance. Gathering people by performing
the funeral, kifudu dance. (drums booming) (singing in foreign language) - [Joseph] So, after the dance, Mekatilili will then preach to them. (chanting) (women ululating) And said, we have a disaster here. People have come here,
they're taking our land. They're taking our children. We don't want them here. (singing in foreign language) Where we are standing here, was the birth place for Kenya nation. (singing in foreign language) - [Afua] Mekatilili
has become a folk hero, the Giriama David, against
the British Goliath. Without money or weapons,
with her people dispersed, she took the thing that
united them, their culture, and weaponized it for her cause. The British responded by
twice exiling Mekatilili, confiscating Giriama lands, killing around 150 people,
and burning 5,000 homes. (whistle trilling) Slowly but surely, they
tightened their grip on their new possession. And what a possession it was. To the British, a space
more than twice the size of their Homeland, with wild Savannah, and mountains of eerie beauty
packed with exotic wildlife. They saw the opportunity,
for a white settler colony. Their idea, was to use the newly finished lunatic line railway, to encourage British farming of the central mountain plains of Kenya, the area with the most
fertile land, coolest climate, and with a plentiful supply of Africans, who could be turned into farm hands. The area became known,
as the white highlands. (car engine roaring) The white settlers were invariably drawn from Britain's aristocracy
and landed gentry. People who felt they knew a thing or two, about running large estates. And who have the money to invest in them. They also brought with them intense ideas about British culture and civilization, ideas that took on a new
dimension in this landscape. But thousands of miles away, from the rigid norms of Edwardian Britain. They regarded this as a place that was kind of
an Eden, uninhabited and wild, the perfect setting for
adventure and freedom. This white romantic vision of Kenya, has had enormous resonance
and staying power. It's been projected across the world, in literature, film, and television. And by one book in particular. "I had a farm in Africa, at
the foot of the Ngong Hills. "The equator runs across these highlands, "100 miles to the north, "and the farm lay at altitude
for over 6,000 feet." In 1937, a Danish Baroness
called Karen Blixen, published a memoir about her life on her family's coffee farm near Nairobi. She called it, "Out of Africa". The book documents the attitudes of the upper crust of colonial Kenya, Who became known as the happy valley set, the tabloid fodder of the interwar years. It also traces the love affair, based on the real life fling Karen had with the Englishman Dennis Finch Hatton. "The geographical position,
and the height of the land, "combined to create a landscape, "that had not it's like in all the world. "The views were immensely wide. "Everything saw, made for
greatness and freedom. "An unequaled nobility." That book, has done so much to
promote an image of Kenya, as a blank landscape, a primordial canvas onto which, the white nobility, privileged people come to fulfill adventure and romance. And the role of Africans in
this narrative is minimal. They've simply existed as accessories to that central white adventure. (traditional music) Safari culture had been
ushered in by the lunatic line. (traditional music) Among early pit helmeted hunters, with their tools, stories and trophies, was American president,
Teddy Roosevelt in 1910. But it was after the 1940s, and the establishment of
Kenya's vast national parks that safaris promise of adventure and sighting big game, fueled large scale tourism and the tourism in turn,
transformed Kenyan art (upbeat music) (singing in foreign language) A typical Nairobi craft market. This is where you find the
most popular Kenyan art. Vibrant celebrations of
the country's wilderness, and safari animals. Being in this craft market in Nairobi, is a little bit like being inside the mind of a tourist idea of
what African culture is. Even though the people
who work here work so hard and there is great skill, I can't help but feeling
that they're often giving, tourists, what they want. Things that feed into their preconceptions of images of giraffes, zebras, wooden carvings that don't have any actual recognizable tradition but kind of conform to
that, big idea of a mask. And then tourists come
here and buy that stuff and feel like their worldview
has been vindicated. - You know this? This is a giraffe. (machine buzzing) The expert wood carvers here, are largely from the Kamba people, can make up 1/10th of Kenya's population. The Kamba Art Movement began
in the early 20th century and invented what some call, a colonial modernist style, that has been eagerly embraced
by the tourist market. Hello. Hey, how are you? - Fine. We make animals, wild animals. Here in Kenya, in our
national park we have giraffe. So they see a big giraffe, after there, they go
and see a big elephant. After there there is rhino and cheetah. That's the most tourist
things so which they like it. We can make anything,
but because of our mind, we are put there, tourism likes animals. - You're from an ethnic group that has a tradition of carving. Can you tell me about that? And how did you come to be so good at making things from wood? - That's not something which I know, because that is my grand,
my grand, my grand, my grandfather. When we were colonized, he tries to go somewhere when
he was a naked, no clothes. So he tries to, find his head, what am I going to close my, my body? What am I going to make? I make a short from wood. - [Afua] From wood. A wooden shirt. - Yeah. Just makes like this one. - [Afua] Okay. - He close there, and he make
another thing to close there. - [Afua] That sounds very uncomfortable. - So, he was, so that he can move because of the colonizer people. - [Afua] Because Europeans came, he didn't want to be naked anymore. - Yeah, yeah, yeah. - [Afua] Highly skilled and popular, these Kamba carvers
make money from tourists and art about the land, at the same time. (soft music) To the east near Kenya's coast, woodcarvings are literally
rooted into the land for a deeper purpose. The Giriama people's villages, are based around sacred
forests called Kaya. They believe they're
filled with the spirits of their ancestors, marked by carved posts that look like human
statues called vigango. Vigango were designed
to represent the dead. Commissioned by the family
after a relative dies, they're interred into the ground during the funeral ceremonies, to make sure the deceased is welcomed into the ancestral world. It's a marriage between
art and spirituality, planted in the landscape itself. The vigango you can see
taking shape behind me is more than just a headstone
or a representation. It's the living embodiment of the spirit of an ancestor who has died. And as long as the vigango
remains in the ground here, it anchors that spirit to their home. (saw grinding) The vigango is nearly finished now, and the villagers are using
red ochre to paint the body, and charcoal to mark the eyes
and the eyebrows on the face. Really just putting those
finishing human touches so that it looks like
the person that it is. (tense music) - [Emmanuel] It's a law of traditional of 100 years ago, culture. - Is the spirit of your
ancestor in the kigango? - Yeah. - [Afua] What is the
purpose of the kigango? - [Emmanuel] To give a
very respectful of him and, it's a sort of magnet to pull things, to bring good things to you. You do it, kigango for him and he release, good things to approach you. - When you made the vigango,
did good things happen? - When I put that
kigango, after six months, I managed to beat this house because my work, herbalist, treatment, it was paying well. Well. - So it brought you prosperity. - Yeah. - So it really changed your life. - It changed. - [Afua] Sometimes these traditions, have brought the wrong kind of attention. Unfortunately for the
Giriama, over decades, thieves and unscrupulous
dealers have targeted vigango. Uprooting them to be sold to
Kenya's booming tourist market. Only now are some vigango,
being successfully repatriated from the private collections
and public museums, where they've ended up all over the world. If somebody came and took
this kigango away to sell it, what do you think would
happen to the person? - If a person who is thief a great thief to come and steal, very, very simple. He has to come here just
uproot as a cassava, you carry it there, and you are in for it. You won't escape, you won't escape. You die or become mad. - [Afua] Do you think
this kigango will be here for a long time? - Even I'll pass through and it will remain here for a century. Even you're granddaughter
will come and see it here. - [Afua] There's been a
real trade on vigangos over the past century or so, and I can see why people value them. But when you understand what
they mean in this culture, there's so much more than
an interesting piece of art. They're inhabited by the
spirit of an ancestor. And their purpose, is
to anchor that spirit to their home here. So the idea of taking them away and trading them for money, is a violation of everything
that they represent. Back in the 1950s, Kenyan resistance to the violations of
colonialism, was mounting. The Kikuyu people were most effected by the white highlands project, and after world war II, as a new wave of anti-colonialism
swept across Africa, their frustration boiled over. The Mau Mau, was a
secret society of Kikuyu, who took an oath to
attack European settlers. In 1952, the British authorities declared a state of emergency. Years of bitter gorilla war followed. Hundreds of thousands of Kikuyu,
were detained or curfewed. Tayiana Chao, is part
of a younger generation of Kenyan historians,
documenting the internment sites that still survive. So the buildings we see here, they were used as cells to keep detainees. You can see barbed wire on the roof. - [Afua] Gosh. - [Tayiana] You'll notice
in some of the buildings you have a carving on
the bricks that says, MWC but that means Mueru Works Camp. And in the works camp the
detainees would make bricks, that would either be sold, or
used to build the structures. - So they were being forced
to build their own prison. - Exactly. - [Tayiana] So you notice that
the room we're in has windows but when this was a cell,
there was no light coming in. So the school has basically
carved out the windows from the brick itself. - [Afua] How many Mau Mau do you think would have been living
in a space like this. - From our research sources and our conversations with veterans, we estimate maybe 60 people. - [Afua] 60?
- 60 people. - In this space. - In this tiny space. - [Tayiana] This is a
torture chamber, basically-- - [Afua] Torture chamber for the camp. - [Tayiana] You'd be kept here alone with very little food
and very little water for a period of, a number of days. I don't know if you can see it now, but they would put water, they would fill the room with water and you couldn't sit or sleep. So you just have to stand. - That's horrific. Do people still feel critical of Mau Mau? Because there was a level
of violence involved. - Everyone selectively chooses
what they want to remember and what they don't want to remember. And you have very many
factions that say that Mau Mau, they were savages that they killed people. You have some that say they
fought for independence. You have some that say
that they gave us Kenya as we know it today. - People who were part of Mau Mau, who fought alongside the more who suffered because they were deemed Mau Mau. Were the sacrifices they made respected and remembered once
Kenya gained independence. - A lot of them left detention, just to find out that
their land had been taken their ancestral land. So they didn't have any land. They had to buy back land from the chiefs or the loyalists who were put in place by
the colonial government. Their families had separated, some of their parents or
their siblings had died. So they came out of detention, I think both physically and mentally in a very deprived state, which continued onto independence. So it was either you abandoned Mau Mau or you just wither, wither away. Yeah. - [Afua] The Mau Mau insurgency
was the beginning of the end for British rule in Kenya. (upbeat music) Jomo Kenyatta, a Kikuyu who'd
been imprisoned by the British on trumped up charges of
being a Mau Mau leader, led Kenya to independence in 1963. Articulate, charismatic
and larger than life, Kenyatta managed to turn this
most British of colonies, into a successful
independent African nation. Nothing better expressed
Kenyatta's infectiously, optimistic vision, the new architecture. Major contribution to that modernist wave, was this building in central Nairobi. It was built by the first
president of Kenya, Jomo Kenyatta, who in a not uncharacteristic
case of showboating, named it after himself. The Jomo Kenyatta International
Conference Center, built as a headquarters
for his political party. With its cylindrical
tower, rising above Nairobi at 32 stories, it was by far the tallest
structure in East Africa, right up, until the late 1990s. Inside, it has a magnificent auditorium, shaped like a traditional dwelling. The design was by a Norwegian,
Karl Henrik Nostvik, but it's a building particularly suited to the tropical Kenyan climate. A bold use of concrete in airy,
open galleries and terraces. Without the windows and
insulation in Scandinavia. In African buildings like
this, modernism was set free. I feel like there are so many stereotypes and cliches about African cities. And this building, is just
one of so many examples albeit a very impressive one, of how Africans decades ago, were already thinking in big
ambitious modernist terms about future, and using
architecture like this to realize that vision. (traditional music) As the city grew after independence, workers from across the continent, brought with them different styles and ways of playing music. Benga fused these styles. (singing in foreign language) A hybrid of Rhumba from the Congo and the folk songs of the Luo
people from Western Kenya. In the 1960s and 70s, it quickly became the unifying
soundtrack of the city. (upbeat music) - [Otieno] It's a very big band. So, when they do practice,
everybody contributes, like you come with a song and then everybody contributes. - So, what's your role? - My role, I sing. - And is that usually one singer, or more than one singer in a Benga band. - We are many singing. (singing in foreign language) - [Afua] How would the vocals in Benga? - Very sweet. It teaches people about living
with one another in peace, and it teaches about day-to-day
life and love mostly. - Very important. - Yes. (singing in foreign language) - [Afua] Is it something
to do with the city and the way people go to work, and they wanna relax
that helped Benga thrive? - It is, it is, 'cause if you see around the people who are here, we have doctors here, we have lecturers here. And then after they come
from work, they want to, to chill their mind. So they come here. When we play music, they
go home, they feel better. You can come here when
you are very stressful and we play like one, two, three songs, you go home when you're happy and smiling. - [Afua] Benga embodies the energy and excitement of the
decade after independence. Saturday night at this
pub in Western Nairobi, is Benga night. - There's people who believe
Benga died a long time ago. Our fathers and grandfathers
who used to do Benga, but tonight if you go around Nairobi, you'll find every club
is playing live band-- - It's Saturday night. So, you're not gonna go anywhere. - No, no we're not going anywhere, so, we're there to stay. (singing in foreign language) - [Musician] Thank you. - [Afua] The excitement for
the future embodied in Benga, spilled out onto Nairobi streets, and found expression in
a very distinctive form. Like London's red buses or
New York's yellow taxis, Nairobi's mini buses have become an icon of the city's official culture. They're known as matatu, Swahili for three after the original
threepence fare of the 1960s. Matatus are the way most of Nairobi's four and a half million people get around. Congestion is a challenge in the city. Many commuters spend hours
in Matatus every day. Given that Nairobians spend
so much time waiting for or sitting in matatu,
perhaps it's no surprise that they eventually become
part of this city's identity, unofficial Nairobi mascots, they're brash, chaotic, noisy, but they also have free Wi-Fi, they're entrepreneurial and full of life. (in foreign language) Today, matatus, are an
unlikely outlet for creativity. If you think about it, matatus are really Nairobi's most visible
version of street art. It's just that in this case, the canvas is always on the move, transporting its ideas and images, round and round the city. Dennis Muraguri, is one of Kenya's leading
contemporary artists. He depicts the chaotic beauty
of Nairobi's street life, through mixed media prints and paintings. I can see your obsession with matatus. They're everywhere in your
workshop, even on your clothes. - Yeah. what is the obsession with matatus? - I just grew up loving matatus and I grew up next to a bus park. They are more than just
a vehicle that takes you from point A to B, they're
kind of concept boxes. So, you'll find matatus with, they try to outdo each other with, some, ridiculous paint jobs, and plasma screens,
loud music, performances by the operators. - You could say that the matatu experience encapsulates a lot of the
challenges of life here, sitting in traffic, not being
able to guarantee your safety, a level of chaos and noise. So you're deliberately
countering all of that negativity by actually actively
celebrating the good part. - [Dennis] Yeah. Matatu without passengers and
operators is just a shell. It becomes alive when
the people come into it. That's the most beautiful
thing about them. (motorcyle engine roaring) (upbeat music) - [Afua] As economic migrants arrived from around the country. Nairobi's growth created new challenges. Today, as many as two and
a half million people, live in slums like this across Nairobi. Almost 2/3 of the city's total population, but, on just a tiny fraction of the land. So right now, I feel like I'm giving you
your obligatory slum scene. And to be quite honest, I'm frustrated with the fact that, depictions of places like this, that don't really get to the bottom of what life here is like,
are still such a prevalent way of depicting African countries like Kenya. This is a difficult place to live. There are challenges
here, there's poverty, but it's so much more
complicated than that. There is so much more going on here. There is such an order to life here that you can't really understand just by looking at tin
shacks or rubbish dumps. And one of the things that's
going on in areas like this, is a really interesting creative scene, that's often, not what you would expect. (classical music) Classical ballet has become
a source of self-expression for children living in Kibera, the largest urban slum in Africa, home it's believed, to
over a million people. Joseph Kanyenje, is one of their teachers. - Point you feet. - [Afua] Were you surprised
that people in Kibera take so well to ballet? - [Joseph] At first, at first. I had a perception, in my head and I said, oh, you're coming to work, you're going to work in Kibera. I was like, oh, God. But then, when I saw how they're moving, I was like oh, there's
no difference from here and other places that
I've have an interaction with the children. My perception were changed immediately. - It is quite a noisy, chaotic area. But it's as if in this room, you have created a very
orderly ballet studio. - I'm surprised how the girls, the girls are the ones
actually who calms me down, because for me, I can't,
I can't deal with noise. But the girls, just like.
- They are not fazed. (classical music) - [Joseph] Do they face hardship? Of course they do have their own hardship, but you never see it. They're always happy, they're
always coming to school, and you see them chatting around. You see them when you ask
them, how do you see Kibera? Kibera is a nice place. It is a nice place. It really is. - [Afua] This ballet, is a reminder that the narrative of Africans, in destitution and in need of handouts, is outdated and unhelpful. There's a real resilience, in
the face of adversity here. (upbeat music) Exploring even further beyond the cliche, we find the very material of the slum, inspiring a whole new art movement. Meshack Oiro is one of the
new generation of artists producing recycled art. A sculptor, he works to up
cycle junk the slums produce and turn it into something positive. I have to say, it's a little
bit hard to see at the moment, this part of rubbish, it's
kind of covered in flies, quite grimy. I can't immediately imagine its potential. - Does you know beauty, lies
in the eyes of the beholder? So, I see beauty in there. - And what gave you the idea to do it. - As a young artist,
coming up with the money to buy materials and not
being sure of the market, it was quite challenging. So, that's why I turned into recycling. - [Afua] Is there an ideological dimension to using recycled material as well? Are you making a bigger
point about the environment? - Yeah, definitely. Because I'm upcycling what has already been thrown away and trashed. So I'm trying to give it another life. - [Afua] How do you pick
one chain from another? There are slightly
different colors, lengths. - Different chains, make different pieces. There are pieces where I
want, really smaller chains, like this one's are small, and you can see they
have some beauty in them. This particular one, I work with the, when I'm doing maybe a face, or a tiny piece. And then, there are
other pieces where I have to use fat chains like these.
- That's a lot chunkier. - Yeah, a lot chunkier. So, this particular one, I can use when I'm making maybe, the body, and I need it
to cover lots of bulks. I would easily use this one, when I'm making a quite a humongous piece. - Okay. - Yeah. Because mostly I need to cover all the blank spaces around. You see this kind of piece? It's aluminum, but also, the aesthetic
in it, is quite beautiful. - I really can't wait to
see what you're gonna do with all this stuff. (upbeat music) Intriguingly, despite the
innovation with materials, Meshack reworks, a familiar
and abiding Kenyan theme. The call of the wild. (upbeat music) - [Meshack] They say
charity begins at home. So my first audience, where I would like the message to go to, are my fellow countrymen, and then out there because
out there is just a plus now but this is our door step so, if it's well here, then
I'm happy with that. - [Afua] Meshack, is one
of hundreds of artists in Africa's burgeoning recycled movement. Using their startling inventiveness to repurpose found material, and create both powerful art,
and an ecological rebuke. African recycled art
now has a global reach. (upbeat music) Today, Kenya finds itself in an exciting moment of transition. With a dynamic, young population, responding with huge creativity, to the challenges of urban life. Nairobi buzzes with energy and expression. Michael Soi is the leading artist here documenting Kenya's journey. His bold colorful style, holds up a satirical mirror to
Kenyan society and politics, and has brought him worldwide attention. This is your studio. - This is my studio. - [Afua] You have a
really distinctive style, very accessible. It really hits you, and your
messages are there to see. - [Michael] What I try to do, is make it as simple as possible to a point where if you
stand there and don't get it, then there's something wrong with you. Make it as simple as possible. - Tell me about this one this is, - [Michael] This is a
piece I did last year after the election. There's a lot of Kenyans who
were killed by policemen, because people contested
the results of the election. All the people who were killed all came from the same region. - [Afua] So you've depicted
it through the holes bleeding. - [Michael] With the bullet holes and then the lines that
you see are actually names of the people who died. So this is a name of this
person who was killed either in Western Kenya
or in the slums in Kibera. - [Afua] Michael is
painting a series he calls, China loves Africa. Questioning the growth of
Chinese power in this region. And asking again, who owns the land? In Kenya, the Chinese loaned $3.6
billion for a new railway line, running alongside the old lunatic line, as part of its belt and road initiative. (train hooting) Many, like Michael,
worry about the debt trap in which Kenya now finds itself. I haven't seen that many artists in African countries where China
is now so heavily involved. - Yes. - Critiquing it in their painting. - First of all, it is not a critic. A lot of people think
that I am criticizing but it is not a critic. The question now that everybody
needs to ask themselves how did China find itself in Africa? China was invited to come into Africa, by who? By the Africans themselves. If I talk about this particular
piece, now all these men, you will realize some
of them are very fat. - [Afua] You've also infantilized them, you've put them in their underpants, they look dependent now. - [Michael] The reason
why I make them fat, is because, the people
who are benefiting from, the generosity or generosity of China, are not the ordinary people. It's the politicians. When you hear of the railway, people connected in government
would go and buy the land from the peasant farmers for
nothing for next to nothing like $100 per acre. And when the railway was proposed, they now sold the land back to government for like a hundred times
worth what they bought it for. The people who are
suffering are the people, are the citizens who
are going to be paying some of these loans. If you have a 10 year old kid right now, by the time they're 20, 25, they'll still be servicing the loans that will go to build
the railway to Mombasa. Me, I will not blame China. China is doing what it
feels is it's own interest. - [Afua] Is this potentially
though, the new imperialism, it's more subtle. It's potentially even more long lasting and definitely omnipresent. - No, I think the British
came with the Bible first, and managed to convince everybody. And then the guys with
the guns came later. The Chinese are coming with money, and when you have a continent
that consistently thinks that we are poor, we are
poor, we are poor, we are poor and come and offer money, then trust me, you will get into whatever
corner of the country you want. As an artist, I think the time for painting beautiful flowers is over. I try to do a lot of work that
evolves around social issues, things that affect the normal
Kenyan on a day to day basis. So I am documenting certain moments, maybe probably for posterity. A kid sitting in a classroom
in 40 50 years time from now, can get a book, look at it, and kind of get an impression
of what Nairobi was like back then. - [Afua] Kenya has attracted
outsiders too often for the wrong reasons. (singing in foreign language) Brutal imperial schemes,
have dispossessed the people, while contorting their story into a cliche that shape perceptions,
not just of this country, but of the whole African continent. Yet here, I found a population and dynamic art scene,
channeling a creative renaissance and frankly embodying hope, amid the legacies of a dark history. A new vision for the future
that breaks through old cliches. (upbeat music)
