On creative arts in Ghana

I have for a very long time been one to criticize any hint of mediocrity especially when it has to do with the creative arts. I have always considered myself to be an artist. I mean, like most artists, i as well as a few others made the best drawings in primary school all through to junior secondary school, as far as i can remember. Teachers from other classes would call on me to draw diagrams on their class boards. You know what i mean. I also happened to be a brilliant student. Well not the straight A's kinda brilliant but I really never did badly at all in school. So when the time came for me to make a choice of subject to study in secondary school, naturally i was in a huge dilemma. I knew i would make a really good artist because i already had it in me by default. On the other hand, as is expected from most brilliant students, i was expected to pursue science, by most of my friends and family. Well! as am sure you can imagine i spent the next three years of my life pursuing a subject that i was not very interested in. It became increasingly clear to me over the years that i belonged to the art class. Paradoxically, i realized also that most of the students in the art class really didn't have the passion for what they were studying and I'm sure you can guess why. Most of them ended up there because they couldn't make very good grades. Putting this experience in perspective, it's no wonder that our creative arts industry is plagued with the kind of mediocrity that most of us despise as a country. But do we have the moral right to complain. We have left it in the hands people who do not have the passion for it and are doing it as a means of survival while discouraging the brilliant ones who have the real passion for it. Until we come to the realization that art is a one of the most effective ways of creating cultural change in a country and as such place the kind of attention that it deserves on it, we just have to enjoy it as it is. In the meantime, i have stopped complaining. I've channeled that energy into appreciating the brilliant creative professionals who are, against all odds, striving to make a difference in their fields as well as the not so brilliant ones, who know that they are not so brilliant, and are striving really hard to get there.  To be continued........