Art is the Way: Mbowa’s Art Leads the Soul

Moses is a multifaceted artist: Poet, Singer/Songwriter, Guitarist, Painter, Actor, Teacher and Preacher of the Gospel. There are very few people who get to use all eight in one lifetime, and even at a young age, Mbowa has already built up a wide portfolio, making many friends and touching hundreds of thousands of lives.

 Genesis

As a child, he was always fascinated by colour, what it can do, what it can be, the stories it can tell. But in the conventional primary school he went to, art was considered a club, not a class subject. But that did not stop him from dreaming. And when he got the chance to take art class in secondary school, he fell in love with art. He would spend countless hours in the art studio, mixing and coming up with different colour combinations, and he knew that art was a career path he would eventually pursue. But before that, God had a plot twist.

The Family that Plays Together

Mbowa, in his senior six vacation suddenly found himself, at the encouragement of his brother, one of only two young men in the finals of a singing competition at a church concert. And when the judges awarded him the prize for best singer, even his mother started to believe in his talents, so much that she bought him his first studio recording session. And that is how Mbowa the singer we know today was born.

And when his sister gave him half a million shillings to buy whatever he wanted, he bought a guitar, citing,

“It’s portable, doesn’t require electricity and accompanies anything and everything.”

And it has accompanied his voice and lyrics to bless not just his family who believed so much in him, but his church as well as his outreach ministry in the slums where he and his team minister, giving the people who dwell here life skills, and hope for a better future, many of whom have joined his discipleship ministry. He recently wrote to his sister, thanking her for laying the foundation for the work he has done through the thirteen years he has played, and taught others to play the guitar.

And the Offers Came Calling

But when offers came to use his gift for a material cause, Mbowa turned his back on a pile of money because,

“My gift is to serve the Lord, and in His time, he will get me where I need to be.”

He wanted to be authentic in his music, whereas the contracts came with fine print that in so many tiny to read and impossible to comprehend words said he should do otherwise. And otherwise is not what Mbowa was given his gift to do.

Loud and Clear

His song Kuwona na Kufa  is a lovers’ all-time favourite, and one couple used it as their honeymoon theme song.  And the worship songs he has written have the same profound effect.

“I want people to see, hear and experience God through my music and art.”

And that’s exactly what you will see in his art, powerfully outspoken acrylics and oil on canvas stories told in the stroke of a brush that bring you into the world of the painter and lead you onwards to the ultimate source of his inspiration.

When one of his paintings was bought a few years ago and given as a gift to a lady going through a divorce, she found so much peace, that she put in up where she would always see it, and it hangs there to this day.

“My art speaks and encourages people at a very deep level.”

And this was always his dream, to make art, in all its forms, that speaks so loudly to his audience that they have no choice but to stop, pause and be transformed, just like he has been. Listen to his music on YouTube here and view his art here.