Category: Entertainment

WASHINGTON — In Oslo, Norway, on Friday, dignitaries from around the world gathered to celebrate the awarding of this year’s Nobel Peace Prize to Filipina journalist Maria Ressa and Russian journalist Dmitry Muratov. But as speeches were delivered and medals presented, voices outside Oslo City Hall were asking whether the most prestigious prize in the world, as many believe it to be, has lost its shine.

In recent decades, the prize has sometimes gone to individuals who, many believe, have failed to live up to the standard articulated by the founder of the prize, Swedish industrialist Alfred Nobel. His instruction was that it should go to “the person who shall have done the most or the best work for fraternity between nations, for the abolition or reduction of standing armies and for the holding and promotion of peace congresses.”

Perhaps most notably, that includes Abiy Ahmed, the prime minister of Ethiopia, who was awarded the prize in 2019 for helping to end his country’s long-running war with Eritrea. The prize committee cited his “efforts to achieve peace and international cooperation, and in particular for his decisive initiative to resolve the border conflict with neighboring Eritrea.”

Today, Abiy is conducting a brutal war in northern Ethiopia’s Tigray region, in which both sides have been accused of a wide range of war crimes.

Controversial awards

In 2019, the same year Abiy won the prize, a fellow laureate, Aung San Suu Kyi, appeared before the International Court of Justice in The Hague, Netherlands. Suu Kyi, who was the head of Myanmar’s civilian government at the time, was there to insist that the widespread killing and displacement of the ethnic Rohingya people in her country was not a genocide.

Another controversial laureate is former U.S. President Barack Obama, who was nominated for the prize before he had been in office for a month and received the award before he had served even a year. Obama went on to increase U.S. troop levels in Afghanistan during part of his presidency, and he accelerated the use of drone strikes against individuals and groups seen as enemies of the United States.

Controversial awards are nothing new to the Nobel committee. Two members resigned in 1973 when the award was given to then-U.S. national security adviser Henry Kissinger for supposedly helping to arrange a cease-fire in the Vietnam War. Kissinger offered to return the prize two years later, after the fall of Saigon.

In 1994, when Yasser Arafat, Shimon Peres and Yitzhak Rabin were given the prize for efforts to promote peace between Israel and the Palestinians, one member of the committee denounced Arafat, head of the Palestine Liberation Organization, as a terrorist and resigned.

Opaque selection process

The Norwegian Nobel Committee is made up of five members selected by the Norwegian parliament. For generations, the committee has been made up primarily of retired politicians. They collect nominations at the beginning of each year and typically announce a winner in October.

All documents and records of the selection process are sealed for 50 years, making it difficult to know exactly what the committee members were thinking during recent deliberations.

This has not made the committee immune from criticism, however.

“The prize is losing credibility,” Unni Turrettini, author of the book Betraying the Nobel: The Secrets and Corruption Behind the Nobel Peace Prize, told VOA. “And when it loses credibility, it loses the potential impact that the prize can have on world peace.”

Turrettini said that populating the prize committee with politicians has led to the impression that its choices are sometimes meant to further the interests of the Norwegian government and its relations with other nations.

“For our country, and as a Norwegian myself, it is in everyone’s interest that we keep the committee independent from Norwegian politics, and that we restore the trust that has been eroded,” she said.

Dispute over Nobel’s intentions

Some believe that the committee has, too often, strayed from Nobel’s original intent.

Norwegian attorney and peace activist Fredrik Heffermehl has been pressuring the committee for well over a decade, insisting that many of its selections have departed so far from Nobel’s instructions, as laid out in his will, that they are effectively illegal.

Heffermehl told VOA that this year’s awarding of the prize to Ressa and Muratov, two journalists who have courageously fought to overcome government repression of the media in their respective home countries, is yet another such departure. While they may be doing admirable work, neither is directly involved in efforts to further what Heffermehl believes to have been Nobel’s ultimate goal: widespread disarmament.

“I’m more disappointed than I’ve been for a very long time,” Heffermehl said. “Very few prizes, particularly the last 20 years, have met Alfred Nobel’s intention.”

Officials associated with the prize committee have vigorously disputed Heffermehl’s interpretation of the instructions for awarding the prize. Olav Njølstad, director of the Norwegian Nobel Institute, has taken to the pages of the country’s largest newspaper, Aftenposten, to accuse Heffermehl of misreading the historical record.

“The Nobel Committee has never accepted this interpretation of the will,” Njølstad wrote. “It does not see that Alfred Nobel has anywhere stated that work for disarmament should be given greater weight than the other forms of peace work to which the will refers.”

An ‘aspirational’ prize

Ron Krebs, a professor of political science at the University of Minnesota, told VOA that it is important to understand that, particularly in the past 50 years, the Nobel Peace Prize has often had an “aspirational” quality to it. That is, it is sometimes awarded to people who are taking early steps toward goals that the Nobel committee sees as furthering the cause of peace in the world.

That could be said of the prizes awarded to individuals working to end the conflict between Israel and the Palestinians, and even the selection of Barack Obama, whose campaign rhetoric had focused on reducing conflict.

“These are the Nobel prize committee saying, ‘We wish to encourage them along this path. We wish to bolster their chances, and we will put our moral weight behind them,'” Krebs said.

Krebs said that can lead people to mistakenly believe that the prize is an endorsement of everything the recipient does or, effectively, will do.

“We need to remember that people who are granted the Nobel Peace Prize are granted it for particular accomplishments, or even particular aspirations,” he said. “But that does not mean that they share all those values that the Nobel prize committee espouses.”

Source: Voice of America

Artists are after God the only real creators in the physical world. In fact, they have the capacity to become co-creators along with the divine, being if they can put all their intelligence and their utmost effort to produce a work of art.

Scientists may invent or modify. But what is assumed as invented is often something that was already there, in the physical world, and it is simply discovered by the tenacious and persistent worker who works at it out of necessity.

The artist doesn’t work, as the inventor, out of necessity, but from sheer inspiration. And the ingredients that the artist makes are not of this world. The artist doesn’t invent or modify. He/ she simply creates. The music of Beethoven and the paintings or sculptures of Michelangelo are works of art of the highest degree and they are physical representations of spiritual truths.

The appearance of television or an airplane or even a computer can at the most astonish or awe the observer, but it can never inspire. One is simply marveled at any new invention while one is taken up to the seventh heaven before a work of art.

No one weeps or is filled with spiritual bliss at seeing the Concorde (the most beautiful plane, in the world, they say) fly or the Symphony of the Seas (the largest and most modern ship in the world) plow its way on mighty oceans. But let someone just take a glance at Michelangelo’s Pieta or Listen to Handel’s Messiah, and one feels himself soaring in the immensity of the universe.

If therefore artists are the medium through which the creator expresses one of his attributes in the physical worlds, then they should give serious heed to their call or vocation and pass the ‘aesthetic message’ in its purest form. They should never take their work lightly and should consider themselves as endued with divine power to change the hearts of humankind.

Man has always been deeply attracted by art. From early times people thought that the gods were pleased by the statues or paintings that adorned temples and holy places erected to commune with them.

The best artists were commissioned to produce representations of the divine. Animals, thought to represent different attributes of the deity, were made to incarnate the abstractions of the spiritual worlds through the nimble fingers of the sculptor and the painter. And the sons of gods came down in the form of artistic productions to intercede between mighty warrior gods and subdued earthlings.

So we have graven images of the jackal, the owl, the eagle, and even the cat in the holy temples of ancient Egypt. And we have the Olympian gods immortalized in marbles in the Greek temples. And those who worshipped these artistically executed idols could easily commune with the other world and hope for the ultimate liberation of their souls.

Music on the other hand has been considered from time immemorial for the appeasement of gods of various temperaments. The angry god will stay his hand from striking the wicked doer at the sight of a consummate work of art and will come to himself at the sound of divinely inspired music.

This being the case, the first people to use this art to get divine favor were the priests. They sang to soothe the ‘bloodthirsty’ gods. At times they sang and chanted non-stop lest Dragon or Moloch (the Canaanite gods) might not change their minds in mid-song and cause the sky to fall on the temple.

Sometimes even the gods who created mankind in the highest aesthetic form could not resist the temptation of coming down and contemplating the majesty of man’s physical body.

However, nowadays, there is a corruption of the arts that result in aesthetic decadence. Those who produce ‘work of art’ for money or fame are to blame for the perpetuation of such a crime.

Let us start with painters. Although from time to time we are witnessing good art displayed in showrooms and exhibitions, most of the time artists are acting as ‘false prophets’ misguiding the laymen in general and the sincere artist in particular.

Are they inspired by the muses or money?

One day a certain father saw his son painting and was assailed by a mixed feeling of pride and apprehension.

The son looked up and said, “Father, I want to become a great painter.”

“You will remain poor,” warned the father,

“I don’t care,” went on the son.

“Then you will become a great painter,” concluded the father.

Art is not something that money produces or something that is supposed to produce money. Art is an inspiration accompanied by a lot of perspiration. It needs detachment from all that is related to money, fame, and the baser appetites of life.

Art is creation, from nothingness. It demands bold experimentation, the probing of the human spirit, the delving into the spiritual and physical needs of mankind. Real art should be able to talk to the heart and to the soul with the aim of changing attitudes, thoughts, and feeling for the better.

It should be in the service of mankind, showing the way that leads to a continuous fulfillment of man’s aspirations, hopes, and wishes.

Naïve might be the word coming out of your mouths but let’s take a moment and think, the greatest artists in history never embarked on their journey of daintiness and creation to make money, they were simply inspired.

Remember Beethoven’s 5th Symphony, Shakespeare’s Macbeth, Hugo’s Les Miserable’s, Rodin’s The Thinking Man, and Michelangelo’s The Last Judgment, just to mention a few. The light and inspiration that emanate from these works of art are like guiding stars in our artistically and aesthetically confused world of ours.

Source: Ministry of Information Eritrea

“To be represented in three categories of one of the biggest competitions on the African continent is a massive win for the country’s art industry.” Yonas Mihretab (aka Minus), Comedian and Director

As his name keeps shining across the entertainment industry of the coun¬try, Yonas Mihretab (aka Minus) strives more to make his name shine across Africa with his famous Hamidda music video, which has won the Afrima Awards (Africa’s Grammy Award) Competitions in the Best Art¬ist, Duo or Group in African Traditional category. Artists from Nigeria, Cameron, South Africa, Ethiopia, Angola, Kenya and Uganda were among the shortlisted nominees in this category. Eritrea was represented in three categories at the competition through Minus, for Best Duo or Group Traditional African Artist, Merry Zerabruk, for Best African Female Artist in East Africa, and Raimon Tesfai, an Eritrean who lives in the Netherlands, for Best African Act in Diaspora.

We got hold of Yonas Mihretab during his busy schedule and had a brief interview?

• Congratulations! This is big, how does it feel?

It’s an amazing feeling. Afrima is one of the biggest competitions on the continent. It is truly an honor to be a winner of this award. For Eritrea to be nominated in three categories at its very first nomination at the competition means a great accomplishment for the art industry in general, a great leap for all Eritrean artists in particular, and a much bigger homework for all of us to do much better.

Personally, this breakthrough has made me see things through a different angle to where I can be as an artist. We can make Eritrea be globally known in art by participating in international competitions. There are also other great artists like Efrem Kahsay (aka Wedi Kuada) competing and winning in international competitions.

• Would you please tell us about your video clip?

Almost two years ago, we came up with an idea for a song in Tigrigna and Arabic while I was working with Natnael Solomon on WediShuq (a comedy). For some reason the idea wasn’t put to action until recently. When we were done with the music arrangements and made the music video, we were ready to submit it to various competitions to be recognized by our neighboring countries and fortunately it was already nominated at Afrima.

What makes it exceptional is the angle of the idea. The good acting and the comedy can be considered its plus side. Hamida is a common girl’s name in the Rashaida ethnic group, which is why we chose it to be the title of the song. We put in a lot of effort to make the setting match the Rashaida habitat and culture. We focused on the Rashiada culture more to give the video life. The music production was done by Naod Fitwi and the nine ethnic group music production.

• How do you feel about working with young artists like the music production group?

I wouldn’t call myself an experienced artist. I know for a fact the power an experienced and a young talented artist have; they are totally different. Generally speaking, in art I feel people who are beginning to do something in their career have just enough enthusiasm and energy to produce a good work of art. I believe in all the artists who are starting to be great at what they do. Also, I have worked with the music group for quite some time now, and I am impressed with their accomplishment. They all have big dreams, and I am proud of them all.

• Did you face any challenges in making the music video?

There were challenges, no doubt. Hamida took on a big budget to make. But in making it we weren’t really looking for big financial benefits or anything else, we just wanted to be known for making a good video clip. So the making of the video took all the energy, skills and knowledge of all the more than 50 individuals who participated. Until recently the video stands at 1.8 million views on youtube.

• Anything else you’d like to say at last?

The three of us who have represented Eritrea in the Afrima Award Competition are not there because we are better than other artists. There have been great artists in the past and there are great artists today and there will be other great artists in the future. I believe we were lucky to get the opportunity this time. The question is “How do we get to the top together as artists, guiding and helping one another?” We all need to consult one another and work together to get better and enter even bigger event.

I would like to thank everyone who has taken part in the making of the music video. Besides, I would also like to thank all the fans who have given their votes for Hamidda to win because voters had a 50% say in determining the winner.

• Congratulations to all of you again

Thank you.

Source: Ministry of Information Eritrea

Nobody questions that women and men are biologically different. The problem is the biological difference is used by many to justify gender roles. But we know that gender roles, which are often taken for granted, are not biologically determined. They are socially constructed and are reinforced through the portrayal of men and women in those typical roles in films, music, drama, and novels. That is why it is important for artists, in general, and women artists, in particular, to be aware of the role of art in perpetuating, oftentimes inadvertently, the status-quo and the need to present alternative narratives that allow particularly women opportunities to tell their own stories. During the colonial period, Eritrean women artists along with their men counterparts were courageous enough to use art as an instrument for enhancing Eritrean culture and identity and for guarding against colonial cultural domination. Amleset Abbai, Tsehaitu Beraki, Teberh Tesfahuney, Alganesh Kiflu, Letebrehan Dagnew and Tegbaru Teklay were some of the artists with inspiring artistic performance and style. In the 1950s and 1960s, the performance of Eritrean women artists crossed over national borders and became popular in neighboring countries and overseas. They were named by their contemporaries after well-known international artists. For example, Sofia Ali, a former suwa house entertainer was named Sophia Loren after the Italian Sophia Loren, an internationally renowned film actress, and Teberh Tesfahuney, the most popular singer in the 1960s, was called Doris Day.

The attitude of the Eritrean society, in general, and the artists, in particular, toward the participation of women in art during that time was best illustrated by Tekabo Woldemariam, a famous singer of Asmara Theatre Association, who said, “Women were kept as gold and their artistic skills were precious. If a play has no woman, it is non-existent. If there is no woman, there is no light. Therefore, in music, a woman is of importance; she has to be kept properly. There was no way we could oppress them.” This testimony forfeited the notion that there existed a widespread negative opinion towards women artists. In fact, art provided an alternative safe space for women. to fight in the frontline of the cultural battle to defend Eritrean culture from foreign cultural invasion. In addition to their participation in performance art such as singing and dancing, Eritrean women were also able to make it in literature. In the 1960s some women wrote and published books.

Following the tradition of the 1950s and early 1960s, revolutionary art played a central role in the preservation and development of Eritrean culture, especially the promulgation of revolutionary ideas to the wider population. During the struggle for independence, Eritrean women played a decisive role in cultural activities, cultural preservation, and revitalization of Eritrean cultural values through arts. Women participated in the EPLF’s cultural troupes. Revolutionary women artists produced inspirational songs that boosted the morale of the fighters and the people and ruined the psychological makeup of the enemy. The revolutionary art depicts the female as an individual who insists on her right to have freedom on her own. The songs of the women artists continue to be a symbol of artistic beauty and national cultural treasury.

Just like the revolutionary women artists that played a role in the armed struggle for independence, many young Eritrean women artists are now playing a significant role in nation-building by telling the Eritrean narrative: it’s past, present, and future. They include Ariam Zemichael, Elham Mohamed, Eden Kesete, Miriam Shawsh, Tirhas Gual Keren, Nehemiah Zerai, Feven Tsegay, Fiori Kesete, Saba Ademariam, Sham Geshu, the Yohannes daughters, Weini Solomon and Yohanna Abera, among others.

Many argue that popular art over the past two decades has not developed in Eritrea as expected and blocked progress toward gender equality and helped resuscitate male domination. They say video clips and films have allowed women to be seen as weak, vulnerable, and powerless which contradicts the heroic achievement and positive portrayal of Eritrean women. Indeed, there are certain productions, especially music video clips, that portray women as objects of sex who can realize their dreams only through their femininity and sexuality rather than intelligence.

The best way to deal with the challenge is to encourage and persuade producers of video clips and other forms of art to stop portraying women in traditional and inferior roles and produce instead works of art that reflect the positive values of the Eritrean society. Eritrean artists, in general, and women artists, in particular, should be aware of their products and make efforts to present women as dignified human beings that they are. And there are many young Eritrean female artists with reputations in music, poetry, film, and drama who can do the job perfectly well.

The social prejudice against women has been waning over the years in Eritrea although no one can claim that it has been eliminated completely. After all, deeply entrenched biases cannot be redressed in a short time. But it is encouraging to see that with every passing year the number of women dedicated to art is increasing, and this is an indication that slowly but surely the landscape will no longer be male-dominated and will give women more platforms to tell their stories from their own perspective and make a tremendous contribution toward women empowerment and nation-building.

Source: Ministry of Information Eritrea

NAIROBI, KENYA — Authorities in Ghana are trying to save an endangered monkey species from extinction. Authorities say human activities are destroying the habitats of the white-naped mangabey monkeys that only live in a few parts of West Africa.

At the Accra Zoo in Ghana, a worker is feeding some of the few remaining white-naped mangabey monkeys. Eighteen of these monkeys found homes in this zoo after their habitat in the wild was destroyed.

Authorities say human activities, such as deforestation and mining, are significantly reducing the population of this species in Ghana.

Stephen Tamanja is the manager at the Accra Zoo.

“The environment or the habitat of the animals we have are affected by human activities. That is just an example. Other attributes could be there. And so, sometimes it forces animals to lose some of their habitats,” said Tamanja.

Wildlife Vets International, a charity organization providing veterinary support to international wildlife, found that by the end of October 2020, there were only an estimated 1,000 white-naped mangabey monkeys in the wild globally.

The monkeys are called white Naped Mangabey because of their gray body, white “collar” neck, and red crown physical features.

Activists are pressing the United Nations to adopt animal welfare as one of its focal activities, in the same manner the world body focuses on protecting human rights and maintaining international peace and security.

The goal, advocates say, is to enforce protection of endangered animals, especially in parts of Africa where animals are treated poorly. David Nyoagbe of Africa Network for Animal Welfare explains why.

“In this part of West Africa, animals are not actually regarded as living beings. People mistreat them so with our education now in schools and the communities, animal welfare is gaining ground and people are beginning to respect animals. Cruelty is now on the lower side,” he said.

Meyir Ziekah, a veterinarian for Ghana’s forestry commission, told VOA that residents of some communities are helping the state in breeding the endangered monkeys and then releasing them into the wild.

“The NGO together with us is actually doing community sensitization and looking for alternative livelihood for the community members who were into hunting and some of these anthropogenic activities that affect these primates. So that when these animals are released, the community feels [like it is] part of the whole project, they have other things to do for their livelihoods,” said Ziekah.

The white-naped mangabey monkeys were once widespread in Ghana, Ivory Coast and Burkina Faso, but they are now only found in isolated pockets of forests.

Ghanaian authorities hope the recovery efforts will help increase their numbers in the near future.

Source: Voice of America

“If you get scared of the unexpected things you do in life, there is no greater thing that you can accomplish after that,” singer-songwriter Ermias Kiflezghi

Growing up around a catholic church in Dekemhare, Ermias kiflezghi got intro¬duced to music in his early days as a child. Ermias’ parents played the piano well. So, it was no surprise that along with his siblings, he enjoyed a childhood filled with moments of learning and playing the same musical instrument as his parents in the church choir. Today, after five years of refining his talents to become a professional artist, Ermias’ songs echo from all corners of the country and have received public appreciation for their deep meanings.

• All was natural, enjoying the taste of music at an early age

Music was something that came naturally to me. It was something like a baby would know how to eat. Being raised by a family that liked to go to church, I grew up learning to play musical instruments and sing in a choir at churches in Dekemhare. As my parents played the piano at the churches, my siblings and I learned to play the piano early on in our lives.

When I was 22, I started thinking about taking my musical aspirations to the next level and thought hard about what to do. This was around 2015, and I released singles, which were not as popular as my latest works. After working for two years and releasing one of my songs, I stopped writing songs and doing what I was doing because I saw a decline in the number of my fans. I wanted to sit back and think about what to do and how to do it successfully. Right after I did that, I was able to make a breakthrough with songs that kept earning me great fans. What I had to go through, living as a bachelor in Asmara, looking for ways to get by and get my works done was challenging, but it taught me patience. So far, I have worked on ten singles, including Demet, Yizikir and Siwinwano (all these songs are currently among the most popular Eritrean songs).

• Deep thoughts, the views of life and how it is lived through the artist’s eyes

If you want to be alive, you have to eat. Similarly, if you want to be great at something, you have to constantly feed your brain information. That’s why I am always trying to read and explore ideas. I don’t want to fail to present artistic works that would speak to many souls. I write melodies of all my songs, and write most of the lyrics of my songs. Many of my songs are about memories. I write these kinds of song because we all live in memories of different times in different circumstances. Through my songs, I want to share the happiness and pain people feel in different situations. Through my music I want to tell stories of different individuals’ perspective of life. I don’t think you make music because you have to; you have to make a pattern for your work and that is what I like to do with my music.

• A church boy now famous

I spent 22 years in churches before I seriously got into art. All I knew before I jumped into the waves of fame that my songs brought me was learning to be good and follow the rules of the church. It was not until recently that I even tasted an alcoholic drink at events that I might be invited to from time to time. So shifting from a strictly religious life to that of a famous artist’s life style was a bit scary for me for a while. However, if a person knows the ways of God and their sole purpose of becoming whoever they have become, then their own strength would guide them to be humble and embrace the fame. If you get scared of the unexpected things you do in life, there is no greater thing that you can accomplish after that. Following this principle, I have never been content with what I have accomplished so far, because I have a much greater dream. I want to come up with works that would allow me and my nation to be recognized globally.

I want to always educate myself; that’s one of the options we have in life and be successful at whatever we do. Understanding this value, at the moment I’m taking a nine-month course in music, which I think would be a great help. I also had the pleasure of taking guitar lessons back in Dekemhare.

Through my songs I would like to get to the hearts of the public. I want to be like the many legendary Eritrean artists that we still remember decades after their works were released. I call upon the Eritrean community to fully enjoy artistic works. All the artists’ efforts mean nothing without the support of the public.

Source: Ministry of Information Eritrea

Among the once-taboo professions emerging from Somalia’s decades of conflict and Islamic extremism is the world of arts, and a 21-year-old female painter has faced more opposition than most.

A rare woman artist in the highly conservative Horn of Africa nation, Sana Ashraf Sharif Muhsin lives and works amid the rubble of her uncle’s building that was partially destroyed in Mogadishu’s years of war.

Despite the challenges that include the belief by some Muslims that Islam bars all representations of people, and the search for brushes and other materials for her work, she is optimistic.

“I love my work and believe that I can contribute to the rebuilding and pacifying of my country,” she said.

Sana stands out for breaking the gender barrier to enter a male-dominated profession, according to Abdi Mohamed Shu’ayb, a professor of arts at Somali National University. She is just one of two female artists he knows of in Somalia, with the other in the breakaway region of Somaliland.

And yet Sana is unique “because her artworks capture contemporary life in a positive way and seek to build reconciliation,” he said, calling her a national hero.

Sana, a civil engineering student, began drawing at the age of 8, following in the footsteps of her maternal uncle, Abdikarim Osman Addow, a well-known artist.

“I would use charcoal on all the walls of the house, drawing my vision of the world,” Sana said, laughing. More formal instruction followed, and she eventually assembled a book from her sketches of household items like a shoe or a jug of water.

But as her work brought her more public attention over the years, some tensions followed.

“I fear for myself sometimes,” she said, and recalled a confrontation during a recent exhibition at the City University of Mogadishu. A male student began shouting “This is wrong!” and professors tried to calm him, explaining that art is an important part of the world.

Many people in Somalia don’t understand the arts, Sana said, and some even criticize them as disgusting. At exhibitions, she tries to make people understand that art is useful and “a weapon that can be used for many things.”

A teacher once challenged her skills by asking questions and requiring answers in the form of a drawing, she said.

“Everything that’s made is first drawn, and what we’re making is not the dress but something that changes your internal emotions,” Sana said. “Our paintings talk to the people.”

Her work at times explores the social issues roiling Somalia, including a painting of a soldier looking at the ruins of the country’s first parliament building. It reflects the current political clash between the federal government and opposition, she said, as national elections are delayed.

Another painting reflects abuses against vulnerable young women “which they cannot even express.” A third shows a woman in the bare-shouldered dress popular in Somalia decades ago before a stricter interpretation of Islam took hold and scholars urged women to wear the hijab.

But Sana also strives for beauty in her work, aware that “we have passed through 30 years of destruction, and the people only see bad things, having in their mind blood and destruction and explosions. … If you Google Somalia, we don’t have beautiful pictures there, but ugly ones, so I’d like to change all that using my paintings.”

Sana said she hopes to gain further confidence in her work by exhibiting it more widely, beyond events in Somalia and neighboring Kenya.

But finding role models at home for her profession doesn’t come easily.

Sana named several Somali artists whose work she admires, but she knows of no other female ones like herself.

Source: Voice of America