Sohan Qadri - Journey To Africa

Journey To Africa

Prompted by Anand, Qadri decided to travel outside of India and devote himself full-time to painting. He had his first international exposure in Africa. Qadri managed to get a fictitious invitation to a wedding in Nairobi, which helped him secure a passport, a difficult feat at the time. When he learned that he could circumvent the three- to six- month wait for permission to leave Nairobi by sailing bunker-class with indigent laborers in the luggage hold of a passenger ship, he and a poet friend immediately booked passage to Mombasa, Kenya. To pass time on the eight-day trip, he sketched his traveling companions, and one day, a passenger from the upper deck. Soon there was a crowd; everyone wanted a portrait done in the realistic style he’d mastered in Simla. For the rest of the journey he traded drawings for food and whisky.

Qadri brought all of his large paintings, which were originally painted in Chachoki for an exhibition at Bombay’s Taj Art Gallery. He hoped to exhibit them in Kenya. When he landed in Mombasa, the port authorities dumped Qadri’s crate of paintings on the pavement because he could not afford a porter. Qadri and his traveling companion sat with the crate for three days and nights until an acquaintance arrived and agreed to drive them the 300 miles to Nairobi.

Once in Nairobi, he contacted Elimo Njau, a Kenyan cultural figure who visited Delhi often. Njau was born in Tanzania and studied fine arts at Makere University College, Uganda. A catalyst of contemporary culture, Njau had established two nonprofit galleries, Paa-yaa-paa in Nairobi and Kibo in Marangu, Tanzania, where both African and international artists exhibited regularly. Njau immediately recognized Qadri’s work, which he had seen in the Kunika Gallery in Delhi. He offered to shuffle another show to squeeze in Qadri’s exhibition. Qadri then went to Prem Bhatia, the Indian ambassador to Kenya, with an introductory letter from Mulk Raj Anand. Bhatia agreed to sponsor the show and use the embassy’s machinery to promote the exhibition. Bhatia bought the first painting for 75 pounds. The show was a sellout and the talk of Nairobi. This exhibition was followed by an equally successful show at the Stanley Gallery in the renovated, American-owned Stanley Hotel.