ART

Minini, "crazy" for Africa and his culture

In his Malindi house even a collection of traditional tools

01-09-2016 by Leni Frau

Could be taken to a habit, considered a life dedicated to the art at the highest levels, the property of one of the most important galleries in Italy, in Brescia and collaboration with photographers and designers internationally.
But the passion for African objects Massimo Minini goes hand in hand with his love of Malindi, where for years now spends his holidays at his villa overlooks the Silversand beach.
After enthusiastically he participated in the biennial malindine promoted by Sarenco patron, Massimo Minini never tires of snooping multi-level artistic and cultural context of Kenya.
One of the latest "adventures" the friendliest and most interesting of the gallery owner and President of the Brescia Museum Foundation is undoubtedly the collection of traditional Giriama brushes, used in the villages of the coast and its hinterland.
Among the customs of the Mijikenda people, of which the Giriama are the largest tribe in Malindi, there to manufacture their brushes to keep clean the doorstep. These tools are usually manufactured with palm leaves or dried stems field, but often are also used animal skins or feathers, rags made from old clothes or fabrics, jute and other materials obtained from nature or from the use daily. Minini has collected many, all different.
At his home Malindina the gallery has also collected the "rungu", the typical sticks used especially by the elderly.
Even in this case, dimenisoni shapes and materials vary, as well as the handles of which some finely worked.
Collections that constitute a rare and complete testimony of local traditions and customs that are inevitably disappearing and that only those who cultivate a passion for all that is culture can preserve and transmit.