25 Jan 2017

When people think of art, they usually think of bizarre paintings and beautiful drawings hung up in museums.

Art enthusiast, Sylvester Koweno, who describes art as his forte said art should be more than just beautiful drawings but instead it should serve a purpose.

The self-taught artist from Molepolole said in an interview that he did not create art for the sake of it but to raise awareness about issues that affected people in their daily lives.

Koweno said  he used his talent which was painting and drawing, to communicate certain community issues that were of concern.

He further said he was proud because his paintings were sending a message to the community and he had received a great response from people.

Sylvester noted that he drew motivation from recent lifestyle of Batswana, social media and other artists who had already established in their work as he believes he is still growing as an artist.

He expressed concern about the enormous impact of HIV/AIDS on Batswana, saying that he was troubled by recurrence cases despite people being taught about it every day.

He explained that he was eager to make a painting that would sensitise people about the dangers of this disease, saying that he was humbled by the attention the painting got from people. He further said  the painting was at Molepolole museum.

The renowned artist who was awarded the HIV/AIDS artistic champion for University of Botswana Red Ribbon Awards in 2013, said he is humbled by the awards he has been getting since primary school till now because that in itself bears testimony of the good work he is doing. He highlighted that his great achievement by far was the BOTS 50 murals at Molepolole main kgotla.

Koweno is currently reading for Bachelor of Art in Humanities at University of Botswana.  He explained that he is very passionate about art, explaining that he is now pursuing it full time and hopes to make a difference with the paintings and drawing he will make in future.  

“I love art more than teaching because it is my passion, if it wasn’t for passion I would not be doing it,” he added. BOPA