Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Lucky Office


 * The following discussion is an archived debate of the proposed deletion of the article below. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page (such as the article's talk page or in a deletion review).  No further edits should be made to this page.

The result was   no consensus.  MBisanz  talk 07:00, 6 March 2009 (UTC)

Lucky Office

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Article does not assert notability per WP:CREATIVE and the one link is a shopping site.  Ja Ga  talk 09:18, 1 March 2009 (UTC)
 * Delete - no notability asserted, little citing of sources. ╟─ Treasury Tag ► contribs ─╢ 09:47, 1 March 2009 (UTC)
 * Keep The sculptor has an entry on the national Zimbabwe sculpture website. Artists which are recognised nationally in this way are virtually always notable. If somebody started an articles on a German sculptor which wa slisted on a national website nobody would blink an eyelid. This sculpor is recognised internationally in America, UK, Germany etc which is grounds for notability for me too. Just needs expansion. Dr. Blofeld       White cat 10:15, 1 March 2009 (UTC)
 * Could you give the link to the national Zimbabwe sculpture website? I can't find it. -- Ja Ga  talk  20:02, 1 March 2009 (UTC)
 * Yeah, the one you say is a national official site in the article just appears to be another shopping site. Calliopejen1 (talk) 20:05, 1 March 2009 (UTC)


 * Keep I agree with Dr Blofeld. It is important to realize that Western artists are much easier to source than third-world artists for purely economic reasons unrelated to artistic merit. The fact that the linked article is a "shopping site" is a reflection of economic necessities which may be outside the experience of many in the richer nations. Katica Durica (talk) 16:24, 1 March 2009 (UTC)
 * Comment Evidently my previous post was too brief to be clear. If you expect to find the same sort of documentation for artists from Zimbabwe as you would find for artists from Europe or the United States, you will systemically exclude the former unless they have been graced by the favor of a Western critic or scholar. I live within walking distance of three insignificant museums of at best local interest, all of which have well-maintained websites. Here, to the best of my knowledge, is the website of the National Museum of Zimbabwe. (Yes, it's a dead link.) Artists who generally make far less money than a teenager hustling fries at McDonalds can not afford to be idealistic. They need to sell their work to survive.


 * I do not know whether Zimsculpt is the national Zimbabwe sculpture website or not, but it is a misunderstanding to call it a "shopping site":


 * "Zimsculpt, a non-political company based in Harare, Zimbabwe, represents over 100 sculptors from across the country."


 * "Every year ZimSculpt selects several promising artists to be featured overseas, providing for their travel and lodging to enable them to attend events in which their sculpture is exhibited and to meet with admirers of their work."


 * "ZimSculpt profits are re-invested in new art works, used to bring artists overseas and to market Zimbabwean talent internationally. The sales from their sculptures pay their rent and school fees, like any of us. Five percent of sales from ZimSculpt.com’s e-commerce website are donated to Inter-Country People’s Aid (IPA), a community-based charity in Zimbabwe."


 * These quotations are extracted for convenience from this website. Yes, the works are for sale, but the Royal Botanical Gardens is not a shopping center. Please note the quotations at the bottom of the same webpage (here is the quoted Newsweek article) for an idea of the importance of this school in general, if not Mr Office in particular, and above all compare with AlbertHerring's testimony as to the difficulty of finding references elsewhere than at sites which offer the artists' work for sale. Katica Durica (talk) 14:38, 4 March 2009 (UTC)

Comment Regarding the source page - I'm not going to comment as to the merits, or lack thereof, of the article itself, as I recognize that I have a tendency to get a little overzealous in my creations. However, I wanted to echo Katica Durica's comment about the source.

Sourcing these articles on Zimbabwean sculptors has been frustrating for me because it's very difficult to find information online. Even in print, I had access to a handful of books on contemporary African art while I was in college, and they did little but mention the names of certain artists and their connection to contemporary art in Africa as a whole. So far as I can ascertain, little of a scholarly nature has been written on the Shona stone sculpture movement, and of that most of it deals with the so-called "first generation" sculptors (the ones who were active in the 1950s and 1960s). And even of those, for some (Josia Manzi, for one) the only biographical information I can find is via these shopping sites. (I use Manzi as an example because I once saw a book on contemporary African art, from a highly well-respected series, that used him as an example of the movement; that's plenty of notability for me, there.) It's an unfortunate reality, but until more scholarship is done on the subject, I'm afraid it's the best that can be done. --User:AlbertHerring Io son l'orecchio e tu la bocca: parla! 18:07, 1 March 2009 (UTC)
 * Neutral. From a Czech site about the history of Zimbabwean sculpture: "Right from the surroundings of these workshops will probably many new stars of Zimbabwean sculpture 21st century. Several of them have already managed to push through at least the individual sculptures in exhibitions in Hararite National Gallery, can be expected that the names as Lucky Office (1976), Witness Chimika (1981) or Samusha Kachere (1981) to be one day become known as the world's galleries." (Právě z okolí těchto dílen zřejmě vyjde řada nových hvězd zimbabwského sochařství 21. Několika z nich se už podařilo prosadit alespoň jednotlivými sochami na výstavách v hararské Národní galerii, lze tak čekat, že jména jako Lucky Office (1976), Witness Chimika (1981) nebo Samusha Kachere (1981) se třeba jednou stanou známými i ve světových galeriích.) Also appears to be a commercial site but if they list him as one of three examples of contemporary Zimbabwean sculptors that seems like an indication of notability. (Also that people who speak Czech care about his work.) On the other hand, almost all the profiles of him I can find anywhere appear to be just slight revisions of each other, so there's not a lot of indication of multiple independent sources. Calliopejen1 (talk) 19:59, 1 March 2009 (UTC)
 * Note: This debate has been included in the list of Living people-related deletion discussions. --Erwin85Bot (talk) 00:01, 2 March 2009 (UTC)


 * The above discussion is preserved as an archive of the debate. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page (such as the article's talk page or in a deletion review). No further edits should be made to this page.