Roots
Yony Wai-te was born in California, USA, and raised in the Pacific Island of Guam. She studied at the University of California, Berkeley, and at the University of Hawaii. Yony sailed to Japan by yacht in 1958 and lived in Nagano Prefecture for two years studying traditional Japanese art under the late Sanshiro Ikeda. Later on, she came to Africa, fell in love with the African wilderness and made Kenya her home.

Yony Wai-te's drawings reflect her unique experience as a child of three worlds. There is a sense of boldness that effuses from her works. Real, but with a dash of the abstract. They possess an unmistakable touch of frontier spirit that can only be described as American.

Yet her style is distinctly oriental. She likes to use black sumi ink to draw lines. Like the Japanese masters who taught her, she paints nature.

Yony's subjects are decisively African, extracted from the Kenyan virgin outback. Zebra in the savannah, tall giraffes apparently dissolving into even taller acacia trees, a nomad asleep under a tree with his camel...

Her unique experience in the mountains of central Japan strengthened her admiration of the Japanese love and respect for nature. One of the paintings displayed at the Centre depicts the house and surroundings where she stayed in Japan in classical sumi-e style.

Sumi-e is a style of painting that was adapted into Japan from China. Over time, it was enriched by local aesthetics and native tradition and was eventually assimilated into Japanese culture. It is characterised by the use of black ink (sumi) made from charcoal.

In her study of Japanese art, Yony Wai-te came to appreciate the philosophical background and history of sumi-e. It is not surprising therefore, that she spends weeks in the bush and the wilderness of the Athi Plains creating her water colours and ink drawings. She also possesses African-style dexterity in weaves and fabrics, some of which were on display.

Branches

Joseph Ogutu, one of those Kenyans who visited the exhibition, described it in just one word-. tantalising.

"Now I am eager to go on safari during Easter," wrote Beerden Jan, a Belgian national who attended the exhibition, admitting the 'born-free' subliminal effect of looking at Yony Wai-te's works.

Some visitors were very surprised about certain aspects of the works. Vincent Odiara was one of these. He noticed that the artist had something about wildebeests. "Very African. But why wildebeests?" Vincent wondered. Yony explains that the theme of migration captivates her. The annual pilgrimage of the wildebeest down the Great Rift Valley is a riveting and awe-inspiring sight to behold.

Yony postulates that the world and specifically all human individuals are in a constant state of migration. Not just migration in the physical sense but also in one's mental consciousness, knowledge and interaction with the environment. In her world-view, migration also exemplifies the dynamic strength of nature.

A deeply philosophical approach to art has obviously been a major ingredient contributing to Yony's success as an artist. Basing on a centuries-old Japanese concept and re-modelling it on the Kenyan environment and her American background, she has created Yony Wai-te Art, which should now claim its own special place among other recognised forms of contemporary art.