Goscinny: Painting his trip from Brussels to Kampala

People prefer to keep their travel and journey experiences on cameras and the latest option are smart phones. But Yves Goscinny, a resident of Belgium, opted to use his talent and passion for painting to create art pieces that reflect his journey from Brussels to East Africa.

Goscinny’s art exhibition at AKA Gallery last week explored his experience from when he boarded the plane, the reception in East Africa and comparisons of Europe to his travel on boda boda in Kampala.

He narrated as he explained his art pieces on display: “I have come to Kampala several times since I lived in Tanzania. But this time, I decided to share my experiences through painting six pieces.”

The arrangement of the art pieces on the walls of the gallery offer a fascinating feel to understand what the artist meant. The piece titled Leaving Brussels exhibits Goscinny’s stepping out of Belgium before he boards the plane in the fog that covers his city. The medium of acrylic and fading in colouring suggests that fog cannot allow a clear view of the city.

The second piece, Flying Big Cities, is focused on the zooming of cities in the plane. “I sat on the window and seeing the cities seems difficult. That is why the piece has small icons because you cannot see the buildings well,” he said.

The piece, Arriving in East Africa, portrays the real region because the artist concentrated on the traffic jam that inhabits the city of Dar es Salaam and street trading.

“On the first day in Dar es Salaam, the city was busy and people were conducting their own business, which is the opposite in Brussels,” he explained.
The Kampala Traffic piece clearly shows the city popular trademarks of boda bodas and the Clock Tower.

Feeling African, Alone in Kampala is one of the fascinating pieces that brings out the feel of The Pearl of Africa due to the artist’s selection of colours of black, yellow and red. “The more I stayed in Kampala, the more I felt African and I become lonely since I had no family members here.”

The last piece of Goscinny is Returning to Brussels, and the Cold Weather where he painted his signature in a man standing in a city full of snow and fog. He said: “The man standing is me putting on a cap to protect myself from the coldness of my city Brussels. But I painted black on my face because I was like an African due to the sunshine that had affected my skin while in East Africa.”

Who is Goscinny?
He is a Belgian self-taught artist, born in Kinshasa, Democratic Republic of Congo. He was raised in Spain and then completed his education in Brussels, Belgium.