Paint Me A Red, Red Rose: Paint Fiesta Ghana

Time commitment: 2 hours
Price: 40 cedis per person
Venue: Every Monday night at 7-10pm at the Republic Bar and every Saturday from 4pm-8pm at H20 Bar and Restaurant in East Legon.
RSVP: Need to register beforehand by messaging six four six nine four three zero three eight one

My favourite painting has always been Picasso's Ma Jolie, "my pretty". It was painted between 1911 and 1912 during his cubism period and is a portrait of his beloved. Picasso always seemed to paint the unexpected but during this period his innovation was to move beyond painting the traditional 3-dimensional view of objects. Instead, he attempted to depict objects from all angles at once instead of just the parts of the object that are visible to our eyes based on our position to the object. So the act of painting his lover from all angles, simultaneously acknowledging and appreciating all sides of her as each adored feature emerged from of his brush strokes in a manner as chaotic and unbridled as his love for her, was quite the metaphoric love letter. Which leads me to today’s feature...

In case you haven’t guessed, the theme of today’s date night post is painting for couples! I was very excited to try out Paint Fiesta Ghana's paint night event. I haven’t really painted since middle school and Beau hadn’t either so we were both hooked by Paint Fiesta’s promotion of their events being friendly towards beginners with absolutely no experience.

Their website advertises each event by saying, “Just follow along while our social master artist guides you step-by-step through the featured painting in about two hours.”

No experience necessary? Instructor led painting class? FREE cocktails? Check, check, and check- Say no more!

You get a double bonus today as both Beau and I will be reviewing this date night activity. Here is Beau’s review of the experience:

A: How did you feel when I suggested trying out paint night?
Beau: I was looking forward to it, more so because I was eager to see how well I would do given it was my first time.

A: How did you feel about the location?
B: The location was fine. I'm a big fan of the Republic Bar because of the Afropolitan ambiance, so I had no reservations there.

A: How did you feel about the overall experience with me?
B: Oh, it was dead awful.... (jk).. I enjoyed it. I secretly wanted to gauge your artistic skills. I guess I satisfied my curiosity. ha! But it was very thoughtful of you given art is something I love but had lost touch with. You inspired a new hobby. :)
The paint crew seemed nonchalant though, somewhat unprofessional. The instructor though- dude we paid for this, how you gonna tell us to “do what we want”? He painted eventually, but his painting seemed average! I noticed a first time painter’s (woman) work was better than his. Smh. The drinks were pretty standard. Kokroko is the signature drink for Republic.
Is this value for money? Yes and no. In terms of spending time with my booboo and doing something new, yes. In terms of actually learning the basics of painting (direction), like what brush to use, the combination of colors* etc.. no.. I am better off buying paint supplies and watching YouTube instruction videos.
*Note that Beau is being polite here. He asked the artist how to make brown paint and was told to combine green and blue. By trial and error we figured out it is actually red and green.

A: Would you recommend it to another person to take someone on a date?
B: Yes, just don't go with super high expectations. Just go there with the notion of having fun.

A: Any helpful tips you would give to someone?
B: Try to wrap up by 9:30pm - ish, because the lights go out by then and they don't tell you prior to beginning.

My positive experiences of the night were that Beau made me laugh so hard I cried three times, I had an amazingly delicious Republic Bar cocktail (the secret is the local Ghanaian gin, akpeteshie!), I had an okay time painting, and I had a great time with Beau and got to see firsthand how talented of an artist he is. It goes to show you that the most important part of a date is who you are with. :)

The unpleasant side of the night was the professionalism of the team. They were almost an hour late in arriving and setting up (no one apologized to us) and they were sullen and quiet the entire time. It was not an environment where you would have a good time if you weren’t already determined to have fun.  At the start the instructor came around to let us know that he would not be painting or leading us because he wanted to “allow us to do our own thing”. I politely informed him that was not what was advertised or what we paid for. He finally agreed to paint with us but it was clear he wanted to be somewhere else and very early on he stopped offering instruction and just finished up his painting by himself.

I am not a natural talent like Beau so I was really looking forward to instruction and tips but there were little to none offered. It was terribly disappointing. It was especially frustrating as the instructor offered opinions about my finished work at the end despite not helping us at all.

To be fair, I have spoken to others who have gone to this event who seemed to have a different artist and were provided actual instruction and loved it. I’m just sad this wasn’t our experience. This event is a really great idea but proper execution is key. I think it is still worth trying out as that may have been a one-off night and I have heard others express that they enjoyed it. There was just little effort put into making it enjoyable for us. 

As for Beau and I, in the future we will probably just grab some art supplies, a bottle of our favourite wine, find a YouTube painter we like, and have at home paint night dates! We will update you as soon as we have our first one.   

For the curious, here is the link to the inspiration for today's post title: A Red, Red Rose

Directions: The Republic Bar is near the famous Oxford Street in Osu. Once you get there you should head to the mall/casino. The bar is on a little side street that is next to the casino. I'm sure GoogleMaps has this location as it is quite popular with foreigners.
 H20 Restaurant and Bar is located by American House in East Legon, just a couple of steps from the trotro/taxi station. Getting to the right location is simple as American House is known to everyone, but it may be trickier to spot H2O. It is a newer establishment so people may not be as familiar with it but it is blue and has a large outdoor screen where they show live football matches.