by Tafara Mugwara
HARARE, March 10 (Xinhua) -- At work, her hands provide comfort to the unwell. Outside work, her hands create visual masterpieces that nourish the eye.
That is the life of Deodoris Mawanda, a nurse and artist from Zimbabwe.
With just paint and brush, she creates expressive visuals that ignite imaginations and invoke emotions. Two of her works, titled "7 AM" and "7 PM," capture the day-to-day experiences of a nurse. The paintings are currently on display at the "We should all be human" exhibition to mark women's month at the National Gallery of Zimbabwe in Harare, the capital.
"7 AM is showing the nurse starting off her shift. She is all fresh, you can see even the colors, even the brush strokes are all warm and calm," Mawanda said. "The other one is 7 PM. This is after she finishes off her shift, a long shift that is a 12-hour shift. She is all tired. You can see from the brush strokes -- they are heavier and the colors are heavier."
Nurses in Zimbabwe are predominantly female. "We start off our day all happy and energetic, but at the end of the day we are all tired because we have put in all our hard work to serve people and everyone," Mawanda said.
"I spend most of my time in the hospital, so what I see every day in the hospital is what motivates me. There are good things that happen at the hospital. We see people coming in sick, and going home all well, so that motivates me, the care that we give to the people," she said.
Another exhibitor, Prudence Chimutuwa, a mixed-media artist, said "the everyday lives of women inspire me to work. That is what I talk about, everyday lives of Zimbabwean women."
"I am just aiming for people to see that women now are out. We are no longer back home, being wives, playing mum, but they are also in the marketplace and making a difference," Chimutuwa added.
In addition, she said, art can convey meaning void of words, therefore it can be the ultimate storyteller.
Another artist, Tanyse Van Vuuren, also a mixed-media artist, said there is something about art that cannot be captured in words.
"So I think it is really important because when you don't have words, it can become a starting point for words. Your ideas can come from the images, or the other way round, but mostly it's helpful to get the images out and then ideas can come from there," she said. ■