The Scavenger
Canvas · 2014 523 views
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Details
- Category
- Mixed media
- Medium
- Canvas
- Dimensions
- 28 × 36 in
- Year
- 2014
- Edition
- Unique piece
- Framed
- No
- Signed
- Yes
When you go to most neighborhoods around here (Jos, Nigeria), you find little kids scavenging to survive. This is common where I am from. Little children age 10 and below leave their houses as early as 6:30 to scavenge for scraps like metals and some valuables from people’s waste bins. Then they go sell them for small small money. Scavenging isn’t necessarily bad, but a child this age should be in class or somewhere learning to work with their hands – as a cobbler, tailor, plumber, mechanic or something. They shouldn’t be in the garbage. The bottles used to be full of liquor. Now some of these kids, they come into contact with some of these things. At a point in time, maybe the consumer didn’t finish the bottle. They throw away one that is filled. Some of these kids, out of curiosity want to taste what is in there, because they have seen other people do it. Now they are small, and won’t be able to handle it. Some may do it once and feel sick and that is all. Others may become addicted. A long-term issue has started with a sip. It’s the same with the cigarette packs. I have seen little kids try to smoke the leftover pieces. There are more and more kids in the city now who are turning to drugs and alcohol to get relief from their situations. From “let me try” it becomes something else. Now there’s one thing about the scavenging. To put this piece together, I had to become a scavenger myself. This is really what made me realize that this is not something that kids should be exposed to. So we have a role to play in the lives of all the children we see out there. It might not be your children but if they turn into thieves tomorrow, or if their lives are miserable, it will eventually affect you. We share space. Their well-being is connected to your well-being and your kid’s well-being.
Many peacebuilding and development professionals work from their offices for governments or NGOs. Emerging artist Luka Chohu (also known as Lucho) works out of his own small compound in the community of Angwan Juma’a, Jos, Nigeria. This is a place where people “hustle” from morning till night to provide for their families – a place where art is generally not encouraged as a viable career path. To be sure, this artist does his fair share of hustling. But in between, he finds time to stretch old sheets over hand-made wooden frames to engage in his own form of peacebuilding and development work. From his small studio, Lucho fuses his artistic talent with his passion for social justice, to communicate the joys and challenges of everyday life in Nigeria; promote peaceful coexistence; and develop the capacities of those around him. His interest in art began in secondary school: “I always had a story to tell. But because I was not good with words or numbers, there was no way for me to tell it.” He therefore began using paint to express his own experiences and feelings. Following secondary school, Lucho moved to the capital to understudy Abuja-based artist, Kelvin Ubani. He then began using his new skills to move his art into broader themes of social justice, inter-identity peacebuilding and the beauty of Nigerian cultures. The purpose of Lucho’s work is twofold. First, using various media, his own art beautifully and honestly presents the paradoxes, joys and challenges of everyday life in Nigeria. It acts as means for himself and others to step back from the daily “hustle,” make sense of what is, and imagine what could be. In the end, what is produced are pieces with both aesthetic value and the ability to communicate such realities to both local and international audiences. Second, Lucho dreams of also using his talent to increase the creative and communicative capacities of others, particularly children in Jos who cannot access proper education, either because of displacement or poverty. Through volunteer work with local NGOs and schools, he has begun gaining experience in this area creating programs for internally displaced and local children learn how to use art to express and value themselves. Truly, Lucho lives as an artist, a development worker, and a peacebuilder.
