Nairobi in August feels like a canvas — rain-slick streets, shifting skies, and galleries glowing with stories waiting to be told. Step inside and you’ll find warmth in brushstrokes, courage in sculpture, and conversations that linger long after you’ve left. This month, the city itself is an exhibition — come wander, come wonder.
EVENTS
Artist Talk: Dream Catcher | Nduta Kariuki | Munyu Space | Thursday 21 August
DREAMCATCHER brings together the work of Nduta Kariuki ( @nduta.kariuki ) and her late father, Paul Kariuki, in an intimate dialogue across generations. Like the dreamcatcher itself, an emblem of peace, protection, and hope, their art weaves together heritage, craft, and memory. From acrylic portraits to crochet, wooden artefacts to photographic prints, the works invite reflection, participation, and connection, preserving what is most meaningful. Exhibition runs until 25 August. Munyu is open Tues-Sat, noon – 6pm.
Art Salon 523 | Kobo Artists Trust, Riara Rd. | Friday 22 August | 4:30 – 8pm
Join the Seven Artists Collective and various other artists for an exhibition an conversation – one evening only.
Her Voice, Her Power | KNLS, Buruburu | Saturday 22 & Sunday 24 August
𝑯𝒆𝒓 𝑽𝒐𝒊𝒄𝒆, 𝑯𝒆𝒓 𝑷𝒐𝒘𝒆𝒓 is a touring exhibition organized by the Amani Peoples Theater and Wanjiku Creative Spaces whose aiming at doing a body of visual work and have conversations on Gender Based Violence focusing on healing.
Book Launch: Echoes of Humanity | Red Hill Art Gallery | Sunday 24 August | 11am – 5pm
An exhibition of selected works will accompany the launch of this book around an East African art collection, by Red Hill Art Gallery.
Kazi Ni Kazi: An Ode to the Hands That Build | KaliWorks, Ngara | Saturday 30 August
A one-day exhibition: A visual tribute to the labor that often goes unseen, yet holds us all together.
But first, a few questions: Are we going to exhibitions? Are we buying art from local artists? What do you want to see when you walk into a gallery space? What would artisan work reimagined as fine art even look like?
This exhibition invites you to lean into those questions.To challenge the idea that art is only for the elite. To see the beauty in bone work, in cardboard paintings, in a smokie vendor’s hustle, a cobbler, a tailor, jua kali artisan, mkokoteni courier.
On August 30th, at @kali.works we honor Kenya’s informal economy through visual art, documentary, and storytelling, spotlighting the hands that build, nourish, and resist invisibility through the works of @art_by_mwatika @official_mafrica and @glass_camop
Kenya is bursting with visual artistry,from street murals to gallery work, yet less than 20% of emerging Kenyan artists sell their work consistently. That’s not from a lack of talent. It’s a disconnect we’re trying to bridge.
Come through. Buy a piece. Start a conversation. Let’s shift the narrative, together.
A Contemporary Art Affair: Emerging African Voices | Trademark Hotel | Saturday 30 August | 5 – 8pm
Curated by Thaddeus Wamukoya (Tewa), founder and director of Tewas Art and Patrons, A Contemporary Art Affair: Emerging African Voices showcases over 20 rising contemporary artists from the East African region and across the continent.
In addition, it serves as a fundraising event to support the Tewas Art African Art Award & Residency Program – 2026, which is designed to foster artistic growth and collaboration through a residency and mentorship program. The program will offer emerging African artists opportunities for creative exchange, mentorship, and connections to a broader network, while providing a platform to showcase their work to a wider audience. Tickets on Ticketsasa.
ONGOING EXHIBITIONS
MASKAN | Creatives Garage, The Mall, Basement | Until Thursday 21 August
Only a few days left to see this compelling exhibition. Femicide is still happening in the country with victims as young as DAYS old. This exhibition seeks to reinforce the severity of femicide in the country with real stories,sounds and visceral imagery. This is a raw, unfiltered way for us to see our reality. A space to remind us that our rights and freedoms rely on somebody’s whims and emotions. Read more about MASKAN in our dedicated feature article.
Zelensky on my Mind, 2025 – Sibylla Martin
Sibylla Martin | Paintings for an Anxious Age | Circle Gallery | Until Friday 22 August
“What moves and interests me is colour, I crave the smell and feel of oil paint and I love what it can do. The tension between colours moves me deeply and what you can make them do is the challenge. My Ukrainian grandfather’s interest in geometric abstract art coloured my visual experience and embedded in me an enduring and instinctive inclination towards the abstract. Studying at the Slade School in London and travels to Italy gave me a disciplined grounding. I developed a rigorous painting technique with the use of traditional materials and proportion learnt from the early Renaissance painters. These two influences share a formality that is evident in my own work.”
Though a lover of nature, Sibylla has never been drawn to depicting the romantic landscape preferring instead to allow the colours an shapes around her to insert themselves into her abstract paintings.
Between Exiles | Adlan Yousif | One Off Gallery | Until 24 August
Sudanese Adlan Yousif arrived two years ago as a refugee from the war in Sudan, carrying only a back pack. His sculpture is extraordinarily expressive and haunting, inspired by the personal experience of the artist as a refugee. Many of the works seem to emit a sadness which is palpable whilst many also display resilience and determination. Yousif says of his works: ‘Each piece here captures a fleeting — yet defining — moment: the moment one makes the most difficult decision of all: to leave. Not by choice, but by necessity. And when you carry nothing with you but memory, memory becomes a substitute for homeland, metal a substitute for the body and expression a substitute for screaming.’
The Architecture of Memory | Leo Mativo | One Off Gallery | Until 24 August
Kenyan, Leo Mativo graduated with a diploma in architecture and exhibits a fascinating series of mixed media works inspired by the concept of the city of Nairobi having a memory: ‘Nairobi is a living body. Its highways mimic spines. Its scaffolds stretch like tendons. Its wounds break open in concrete. The Architecture of Memory renders the city as anatomy – fragile, reactive, breathing. Its structures don’t just shelter; they remember. Every crack, every residue, every handmade repair is an imprint of the lives that passed through.’
The Beginnings Show | Group Exhibition | Old Rooftop Viewing Gallery, Village Market | Until 25 August
An open rehearsal for a continuous, and collaborative practice. A first attempt to think of art not as an individual product, but as a space of encounter — a shared walk, a process of trying, thinking, and making together. Featuring works by:
Amani | Herra | Hozaifa | wraag | Sannad | Waleed | Yathrip
Crossed Perspectives | Joseph Bertiers & Newton Eshivachi | Alliance Française | Until 31 August
This exhibition is an artistic dialogue between two generations of Kenyan artists: Joseph Bertiers, internationally recognized for his witty artworks, and Newton Eshivachi, a sharp-eyed emerging artist.
The two artists explore the complexities, aspirations, and contradictions of Kenyan society. Bertiers, known for his satirical and narrative style, offers a biting yet humorous critique of political and social absurdities. In contrast, Eshivachi presents a more introspective vision, shaped by identity quests and the cultural dynamics of a younger generation.
Between collective memory and contemporary realities, satire and visual poetry, this exhibition invites viewers to reflect—critically, ironically, and with engagement—on Kenya’s past and present.
Self Talk | Ronnie Ogwang | Banana Hill Art Gallery | Until 31 August
“Self Talk,” a powerful solo exhibition by Ugandan artist Ronnie Ogwang. Rooted in personal reflection and unflinching honesty, this body of work draws viewers into a deeply introspective journey that explores the intersections of identity, loss, truth, and resistance.
Fragments of Becoming | Scopt | Holmes a Court Gallery, Afrika House, Hardy | Until 2 September
Harrison Karanja Kiuru (born 1985), professionally known as Scopt, is a multi-styled contemporary artist from Kikuyu, Kenya. Originally emerging from Nairobi’s graffiti movement, Karanja’s work fuses dynamic mark-making with bold acrylics, spray paint, charcoal, and pastels. The current exhibition is a multi-sensory exploration of personal and cultural transformation, investigating the thin lines between strength and fragility, solitude and solidarity. The exhibition unfolds through distinct thematic zones, from rupture and reflection to re-formation. Using mixed media works through distorted figures and layered text, he challenges perception and evokes introspection.
Faces | Group Exhibtion of artists from Kibera | Ardhi Gallery | Until 16 September
Brikicho | Group Exhibition | Nairobi Art Gallery | Until 27 September
Over 30 Kenyan women artists have answered African Art Agenda’s @artstudionotes call, revealing works that challenge erasure and reclaim public space for their stories.
Brikicho—Swahili for hide-and-seek—has become a collective act of finding, seeing, and amplifying. And now, you can view the works and engage at Nairobi Gallery.
Ministry of Discovery | Mika Obanda | Until 28 September
A solo showcase of new works by Mika Obanda
Skin as a Noun, as a Verb | Tevin Noel | Sena Art X Under The Swahili Tree, Karen | Until 30 September
Tevin Noel is a self-taught visual artist whose practice explores transformation, identity, and the emotional terrain of becoming. Rooted in the symbolic language of trees and texture, his works evoke a poetic tension between solitude and self-renewal. Noel says, “We do not simply grow; we unravel, rebuild, and reimagine ourselves in pieces.” Through three phases; Deep Introspection, Attempts at Actual Change, and Taking Form, this exhibition invites viewers into a meditative space of self-examination. Here, “skin” becomes a metaphor for memory, rupture, and quiet emergence.
Forms of Fray | Anita Kavochy, Jonathan Sölanke, Gathaara Fraser, Liz Kobusinge & Darlyne Komukama | The African Arts Trust | Opening Friday 15 August, 6pm-8pm. | Until 18 October
“Forms of Fray” brings together four artists whose practices explore the intimate interplay between memory and materiality, where the act of remembering is embedded in the textures, forms, and gestures of the work. Committed to paper not only as a surface, but as a carrier of meaning, and trace, their work is shaped by an attention to the processes of material, to what is gathered, altered, and left incomplete — imbuing what arrives with a material poetics: of fibres that hold, edges that unravel, forms that resist closure.
Liz Kobusinge crafts paper by hand, embedding the labour of making into each sheet, and together with sound artist Darlyne Komukama they print onto this paper, working the seams of collaboration in a way both tactile and conceptual. Kavochy gathers: discarded newspapers, fragments of public memory, overlaying them with painted scenes that disturb while reassembling what remains. Jonathan Fraser’s delicate drawings, rendered in watercolour, sit lightly on the surface, as if to mark without claiming.
The exhibition proposes fray not as failure, but as method and measure. To suggest that no material, no memory, no body arrives whole, or remains so for long.
UPCOMING EXHIBITIONS
The Seed Within, 2025 – Priya Shah
Energy Never Lies | Prina Shah | One Off Gallery | Opening 30 August | Until 21 September
“Energy Never Lies” was inspired by a series of questions that emerged from my earlier body of work, the Divine Feminine. Questions that further investigate the true nature of the self through the lens of energy. Through these investigations, Shah invites the audience to explore their own frequency, energy, vibration, and the information received. To question, if you could harness this energy, what would your desired reality look like?
Osiris, 2016 – Talitha Puri Negri
My Secret Life of Red | Talitha Puri Negri | Opening 30 August | Until 21 September
Negri says she is intrigued by red, as it is a colour that affects the human psyche. Studies have shown that waitresses who wear red are more likely to receive bigger tips from men. Olympians who wear red in combat sports, statistically have an edge over their opponents. “Over the years I have subconsciously, and later consciously, been documenting my contact with red. From the houses of my childhood in the Tuscan hills to the walls in the slum of Korogocho. Red resonates with identity, with love, with passion and all the feelings that are connected to our homes and people who live in them. Red is the colour of the Kenyan soil, of the country I have chosen to live in and that has made me the person I am today.”
Hope: Recent Paintings | Beatrice Wanjiku | Opening 30 August | Until 21 September
An informal showing of Wanjiku’s recent works. Images are not yet available – visit the show to see the works!