Ethiopia: Emerging art scene pits creativity against profits

Tesfaye Hiwet started visiting his homeland from the US shortly after the 1991 revolution that brought down Ethiopia's communist-inspired military dictatorship known as the Derg. One reason was to source art for his Washington-based restaurant and nightclub.

After noticing the lack of galleries in the Ethiopian capital, he moved back to Addis Ababa 12 years ago and opened the Makush Art Gallery and _Restaurant, starting with a handful of artists. 

Nowadays, every wall in Makush is blanketed with vivid Ethiopian paintings depicting scenes ranging from monks praying in the dawn half-light to bustling markets and images of wide-eyed, elongated women.

Addis Ababa has an active art community that can benefit from the lucrative sales at Makush, which now has about 70 artists on its books and a collection of more than 650 paintings.

But not all the city's artists want to get involved with Makush because of its unabashed commercial focus -- at the sacrifice,