News & Events
The Confucius Institute in collaboration with the department of Fine Art and Design held a successful Exhibition/seminar at the Department’s gallery on Tuesday 13th November, 2018.
This event was held under the auspices of the Confucius Institute and involved a host of invited practicing artists who brought samples of their paintings for the day-long exhibition/seminar. The theme of the event was ‘Painting – the convergence between practice and Academia’. The rationale for the exhibition was to provide an opportunity for students at the University to interact with practicing Artists on pertinent artistic matters mainly pertaining to thematic interpretation, critical thought and derivation of subject matter, composition and development of personal style in painting, a key discipline in the Fine Arts. The students took the unique opportunity to view the paintings on display and had a fruitful interactive session with the artists where they exchanged views on the Kenyan Art scene touching on opportunities, successes as well as challenges faced by practicing Artists. This was deemed important since the students would join the professional art world in due course and needed useful anecdotes on how to successfully launch and navigate their artistic careers. The rapporteur, Dr Kamau Wango encouraged local artists to work together to advance their course and observed that there has been a notable ‘renaissance’ of the Fine Arts in Kenya, particularly in painting. He told the students that there was a clear coloration between critical thinking and creativity and that artists like all other creative people were opinion leaders of society.
The opening of the exhibition/seminar was attended by the former Dean of the School of Visual and Performing Arts, Dr. Timothy Njoora, the Chinese Director at the Confucius Institute, Prof. Li Jing accompanied by several Chinese volunteers, the Chairman of the Department of Fine Art and Design, Mr. Adon Ombura, the CI Di rector, Dr. Kamau Wango, a number of Fine Art lecturers and students of painting. The Chinese Director observed that the Confucius Institute was pleased to be associated with such events and was ready to partner with the Department of Fine Art in the area of culture and artistic creativity and hoped that relevant partnerships in this arena can be pursued with the partner University in China (Shan dong Normal University, Jinan) in the near future. She invited students of Fine Art to study Chinese language and Culture and take advantage of opportunities provided by the Confucius Institute at Kenyatta University.
The Chairman of the Department, Mr. Ombura thanked the Confucius Institute for sponsoring and co-organizing the Seminar for the benefit of the Fine Art students and hoped that this kind of collaboration will continue to bear fruit. The invited artists included among others, Mr Patrick Mukabi who has built a commendable internation al exposure and Mr. Adrian Nduma,a former student who has become a successful practicing artist.
- Details
On July 19, the Confucius Institute of Kenyatta University held its first Martial Arts Competition.
The competition consisted of two groups; Primary and Intermediate, performing "eight-style Taijiquan" and "twenty-four-style Taijiquan" respectively. The judges synthetically evaluated the performance of the contestants according to their performance integrity, action standard and error degree.
Each group had one first-class, one second-and-third-class prize and several excellent prizes. Before the start of the competition, the referees took an oath saying they would uphold the principle of fairness and justice in the competition and strictly implement the scoring standards. As a representative of the contestants, Alina Cichoki, a student of Confucius Institute, pledged that all the contestants would seriously participate in the contest, abide by the rules of the contest, and achieve the level and style of the contest.
The opening speech was given by CI Chinese Director Li Jingzhi, who first expressed her gratitude to all the guests for attending the competition. At the same time, she was very happy to see that so many students had developed interest in Chinese martial arts and entered the competition.
The competitions of the junior and intermediate groups were held on the same day, morning and afternoon respectively. The players were elegant, honest, excellent and rigid. Every move was given full play to the usual practice, especially the "24-style Taijiquan" performance of the intermediate group.
After a fierce competition, Naomi Macharia, Pauline Wanjiru, Geraldine Mulimi won the first, second and third prizes, while Eugene Teddy, Wakoli Steve and Alina Cichoki won the first, second and third prizes. CI Director Prof. Li Jing and the distinguished guests presented the awards to the athletes and congratulated them.
- Details
Candidates queue to enter the exam hall to sit for the various levels of HSK exams
The Confucius Institute conducted the second HSK/HSKK tests on Sunday 14th October, 2018. The tests are conducted twice annually, the first having been held in February, 2018. These are key international Chinese language proficiency tests that are administered by the Confucius Institute headquarters, Hanban. They are major determinants for qualification for various categories of Chinese scholarships and range from preliminary level one (Level 1) to highly skilled level six (Level 6). The Confucius Institute at Kenyatta University is an accredited testing centre and hence serves candidates from within and outside the University. All Confucius Institute students are encouraged to undertake these tests in order to upgrade their Chinese language credentials in readiness for scholarships in China or job opportunities locally.
- Details
The Kenyan Chapter of the 12th Chinese Bridge global Foreign Student’s Competition was held in Kenyatta University on 29th July 2019. 8 contestants drawn from different Confucius Institutes and classrooms in the country took part in the tight completion. Stacy Njeri won the overall price and will be representing Kenya in the next stage of the completion to be held in China.
The theme of this year’s competition was “Learning Chinese, Creating a Brighter Future”. The Competition was divided into three parts; Speech, Answering Common Knowledge Questions and Talent Show, with each contestant having the opportunity to score 100 marks. The contestants showcased high level mastery of the Chinese language in their speeches to the awe of students, invited Chinese Businessmen, Corporates and representatives from the Chinese Embassy in Kenya. The winner wowed the crowd with the ease with which she made Chinese tea during the talent show. Notably, the only male contestant Rashid Kopar won best talent award as he played the guitar and sang a song in Chinese amid great cheers from the audience.
Gracing the event were students of Chinese language from different CIs in Kenya and their teachers. Chinese Corporates in Kenya were present as well led by Xiao Mi Smartphone Company that gave gifts to the winners of the competition.
The best eloquence award went to Opera Rita Mukami who gave her 3 minute speech in impeccable Chinese. Best style award went to Ngugi Mercy Wangari.
In her speech at the end of the competition KU’s Dr. Elizabeth Andango from the Music Department asked the students to work harder and excel not just in Chinese but in other subjects as well, then get the chance to join KU for their university studies.
- Details