Portraits from Ethiopia : George McBean

I first left Edinburgh as a young graphic designer and travelled to Uganda in 1970 and stayed there two years teaching art in a school in Mbale. I found great rewards in doing portraits of people and great fun in showing the results to those that sat for me or posed quickly for sketches.

Later I began working for UNICEF in Nairobi… and they required me to illustrate as best I could - all the things that UNICEF wanted parents and young mothers to know about protecting and caring for their children. I found the interests of people peaked when I illustrated the differences in the various ethnics groups. (In those days line drawings were printed in better quality than photographs and most young mothers were pre-literate… visual aids were often the first/only means of communicating health messages.) Even in the direst of circumstances - in refugee camps for example- I found drawing someone’s portrait and showing them - produced laughter and widespread discussion. I found if I drew accurate portraits, people could tell more than I could from the drawing (i.e. what ethnic group people came from and how many children the mother had - was discovered in my drawings of the skin markings, clothes and the jewelry/ornaments that people were wearing).

Since retirement back in Scotland, I’ve renewed my interest in portraits. Six years ago my wife, Sara Cameron McBean organised and has continued to run the Scottish Portrait Awards (for which I dutifully designed a logo and have helped to evolve.) It is now the foremost competition and exhibition of portraits in Scotland. Since lockdown I have painted over 400 portraits (none of which can be entered for the Scottish Portrait Awards- because my wife runs it.) Nevertheless, I’ve been inspired and humbled and befriended some of the country's leading portraits painters and have been impressed by the work of young talented artists.

On a recent trip to visit our son and his family in Ethiopia … I painted some 26 portraits on my IPad.

Those shown all approved and offered to pose… they consist of a mixture of local taxi drivers, security guards, street coffee sellers, gardeners, tour guides, wives and children… all of whom responded with laughter when I showed them their portraits. (Even the tortoise seemed to chuckle).

Here is a selection of sketches from Addis.