By Zinia Mbaroro
THE mouth is a cave where words hide but for local sculptor and painter, 74-year-old Mateus Hitwikwa, his works are the caves where his words reside.
As a shepherd at a farm during the apartheid era, Hitwikwa was required to roam the fields alone with no one but the company of his sheep to get through the lonely day and night.
He then began to speak through works as he resorted to painting rocks and carving out animal sculptures in the fields while caring for the sheep. According to Hitwikwa, he would even talk to the trees and communicate with nature often as he developed a sense of awareness that made him know exactly the art work to produce from some of the inanimate objects surrounding him.
“I started off as a shepherd and there was no one to talk to but my sheep. It might sound crazy but I started communicating to everything around me from the sheep to logs lying around me. I saw the animals within the pieces of wood or a tree branch and through my interaction with my surroundings, I became one with them and this is how my journey to become a sculptor and a painter started,” explains Hitwikwa.
Despite his old age, Hitwikwa is employed at the Namibia Craft Centre where his art has been well received and is being recognised. One of his sculptures ‘waiting for the rain’ was acknowledged by the National Art Gallery of Namibia, Standard Bank Namibia at collection, and the Rehoboth museum collection. There are also private collections of his art work in Europe. He has gone from being a sheep herder to a well recongnised craftsman and he says that he is very happy with the work he does, the acknowledgements and the influence of his art.