Budding artists count their chickens

EVER eager to go where no chicken has been before, Nando’s has supported emerging South African artists for almost 14 years. Hatched in 2001, the Nando’s Art Initiative was established as a partnership with Cape Townbased Yellowwoods Art Consultancy with CEO Jeanetta Blignaut driving the programme and curating the art. Its objective is to identify emerging local talent and help develop artists’ skills until they are able to sell their work and sustain full-time careers.

“Jeanetta and her team at Yellowwoods develop programmes to source art and nurture artists’ careers through skills development and art education. Artists are required to regularly submit artwork, which is assessed by Yellowwoods before (hopefully) being included in the collection,” explains the initiative’s Kirsty Niehaus. “Artists receive immediate cash payment for their work and, because the demand for art is always growing in Nando’s global network, they are encouraged to focus solely on their careers and continually produce more artwork.”

The result, for Nando’s, is an 11,000-piece collection, said to be one of the largest assemblages of South African art. It has been exhibited in more 1,100 restaurants in 24 countries. The inaugural Nando’s art exhibition called Rites and Duties was held at Constitution Hill in April this year. Nando’s and Yellowwoods Art Consultancy were named winners of the Increasing Access to the Arts Award in recognition of their monthly art-sourcing programme, the Chicken Run project.

Introduced in 2013, the Chicken Run invites “high performing artists” already involved in other Nando’s art programmes in Cape Town, Johannesburg and Zimbabwe to produce additional bodies of work. These are evaluated by Blignaut and her team with a view to being purchased for the Nando’s collection. Says Blignaut: “This gives artists further opportunity to benefit by earning regular income.”