Press Release

Launch of HIV/AIDS Mural at Mandume Primary School On November 30, 2007

The American Cultural Center invites the media to attend the launch of a mural promoting HIV/AIDS awareness and prevention at 11h00 at the Mandume Primary School on Friday, November 30, 2007. 

Mr. Ray Castillo, Public Affairs Officer for the US Embassy, Mr. Papa Shikongeni, Director of the John Muafangejo Art Centre (JMAC), Mr. Heni Shilongo, Principal of Mandume Primary, and Mr. Philip Ngambali and Ms. Helena Mojao, art teachers at Mandume Primary, will make remarks.  Learners and teachers will attend the event that will take place in front of the mural that covers the entire end of one of the school buildings. The bright mural depicts Namibia’s diverse cultures involved in HIV/AIDS prevention and birds spell “hope” across the skies above Katutura.

The mural is the second of three murals painted at schools in Windhoek and Okahandja in an HIV/AIDS Awareness Mural Painting Project implemented by JMAC and funded by a PEPFAR grant from the Public Affairs Office of the US Embassy.   Funding for the murals amounted to US$10,000.

Learners and JMAC artists and Coordinators painted the murals at the Dawid Bezuidenhout High School in Khomasdal, the Mandume Primary School in Katutura, and the Aurora Primary School in Okahandja.  The project’s vision is to create HIV/AIDS awareness; allow learners and artists to express their feelings about HIV/AIDS; and demonstrate the value of visual art in the depiction of cultural and historical heritage, and social issues. 

The murals have caught the imagination of Namibians and Americans alike.  The Officer of the Global AIDS Coordinator, at the Department of State in Washington, DC, will be featuring these images in its online art gallery – www.PEPFAR.gov - for World AIDS Day.

A fourth mural is planned for the Katutura Community Art Centre early in 2008.

For further information, please contact Public Affairs Officer, Ray Castillo, at 0811280816, or Information Assistant, Roger Lyners, at 229801 [ext. 226]