Opening: April 7th 2019 at 2pm
Venue: Nairobi Gallery
Dates: April 8th 2019 – November 7th 2019
Pioneer Women of the Arts Exhibition, Until Dec. 8 2018 @ the Nairobi Gallery – CBD
Dates: Until December 8, 2018
Venue: the Nairobi Gallery
Entry: Museum Rates Apply
Exhibition by nine remarkable women from East Africa, namely; Joy Adamson, Rosemary Karuga, Robin Anderson, Nani Croze, Margaret Trowell, Magdalene Odundo, Geraldine Robarts, Yony Wai-te and Theresa Musoke
International Museum Day at the Nairobi Gallery, May 19 2018 @ the Nairobi Gallery
Date: May 19, 2018
Venue: Nairobi Gallery
Nairobi Gallery will be celebrating the International Museums Day on 19th May 2018 from 10am to 1pm. Come and have an experience with the elderly people passing Knowledge to the young people through the outlined activities.
ECCE- HOMO, an Encounter with Early Machismo And Migrants Forever? Exhibition by YONY WAI-TE @ the Nairobi Gallery
Venue: Nairobi Gallery
Time: 2 pm
Free Entry on the Opening Day
About
Ecce- Homo, an encounter with early machismo is a body of work that was inspired early last year when I unexpectedly encountered a group of enormous rusting steel sculptures, depicting early Stone Age hunters and their prey, high in the cactus covered High Sierras of central Baja California, Mexico.Based on rock paintings by the isolated and mysterious hunter gatherers of that spiny inhospitable region, those sculptures, by a seemingly unknown artist and standing ten feet tall completely bewitched me with their virile splendor. I somehow realized anew how powerful it must be to be a “Man” wild and free, hunting with your mates and with them being the sole providers for the clan, family or herd.
Migrants is a subject I have explored in so many ways over the years. Nowadays once free moving people have become herds of landless and pathetic migrants. What kept me in Africa as a painter for so many years was mostly this once vast land with its free roaming animals. Now there is really no room left to roam free. Hence the question, Migrants forever? Yony Wai-te
Nigerian Festival in Nairobi, Oct. 1 – Nov 30 2017 @ National Museum, Nairobi Gallery & Alliance Française
Dates: October 1 (Nigeria National Day) – November 30, 2017
Venues: Nairobi Gallery, Nairobi National Museum and the French Cultural Centre
Organised by Alan Donovan – he of the African Heritage House – and other collaborators.
Exhibition: Transitions by Boniface Maina, Until Jun. 30 2017 @ Nairobi Gallery
Dates: Until June 30, 2017
Venue: Nairobi Gallery
Time: 8.30 am – 5.30 pm
Entry: Museum Rates Apply
About
Boniface Maina represents a new breed of promising young contemporary artists in Nairobi. He has exhibited widely in East Africa and internationally. He has co-founded a cooperative of young artists in Nairobi known as Brush Tu Art Studio.Born in 1987 at Nanyuki, Kenya, Boniface studied at the YMCA Training Institute, graduating with a diploma in art and design in 2008. He works primarily with acrylics on canvas and inks on paper. He is inspired by human reactions, personal experiences, dreams and daily encounters which he illustrates through his surrealist scenes and figures.
Thus, he is part of a new generation of artists who are finding fame and fortune both at home and abroad through a combination of training, exposure and inner reflection based on their unique perspective in present day Kenya. This is both a continuum and a departure from the “Pioneer Artists” of East Africa who have been exhibiting works at the Pioneer Gallery of the Old PCS Office for the past several years.
These artists commenced their careers at the time of Kenyan independence or shortly thereafter, against all odds, as art was not considered a priority at that time. The Pioneer artists based their works primarily on tradition, yet they have opened paths and set stages for those who follow, such as Magdalene Odundo, the first Kenyan to receive the Order of the British Empire from the Queen of England for her brilliant ceramic works (she is now installing mammoth tableaus of glass in various parts of the world).
TRANSITIONS is the title for a series of exhibitions which seek out and promote a younger generations of artists like Boniface Maina. Maina will premiere a new series of works, debuting his “new” style, which will be a marked departure from what his fans have been accustomed to in the past. Maina’s works have been published in a book, Masters of Contemporary Art Volume I, by Art Galaxie, an organization that serves to promote and disseminate the artwork of contemporary artists.
Boniface has had numerous solo and joint exhibitions including the Kenya Art Fair, the Kenya National Theatre, Alliance Francaise, the Italian Institute of Culture, the UNHCR, the Circle Art Gallery – Lamu exhibitions, and the Nairobi National Museum. He has also exhibited through the Danish and Russian Embassy residences and at Glocal Art Gallery, Denmark.
Exhibition: Transitions by Boniface Maina, Apr. 23 – Jun. 30 2017 @ Nairobi Gallery
Opening: April 23, 2017
Venue: Nairobi Gallery
Time: 12 pm
Dates: Until June 30, 2017
Time: 8.30 am – 5.30 pm
Entry: Museum Rates Apply
About
Boniface Maina represents a new breed of promising young contemporary artists in Nairobi. He has exhibited widely in East Africa and internationally. He has co-founded a cooperative of young artists in Nairobi known as Brush Tu Art Studio.Born in 1987 at Nanyuki, Kenya, Boniface studied at the YMCA Training Institute, graduating with a diploma in art and design in 2008. He works primarily with acrylics on canvas and inks on paper. He is inspired by human reactions, personal experiences, dreams and daily encounters which he illustrates through his surrealist scenes and figures.
Thus, he is part of a new generation of artists who are finding fame and fortune both at home and abroad through a combination of training, exposure and inner reflection based on their unique perspective in present day Kenya. This is both a continuum and a departure from the “Pioneer Artists” of East Africa who have been exhibiting works at the Pioneer Gallery of the Old PCS Office for the past several years.
These artists commenced their careers at the time of Kenyan independence or shortly thereafter, against all odds, as art was not considered a priority at that time. The Pioneer artists based their works primarily on tradition, yet they have opened paths and set stages for those who follow, such as Magdalene Odundo, the first Kenyan to receive the Order of the British Empire from the Queen of England for her brilliant ceramic works (she is now installing mammoth tableaus of glass in various parts of the world).
TRANSITIONS is the title for a series of exhibitions which seek out and promote a younger generations of artists like Boniface Maina. Maina will premiere a new series of works, debuting his “new” style, which will be a marked departure from what his fans have been accustomed to in the past. Maina’s works have been published in a book, Masters of Contemporary Art Volume I, by Art Galaxie, an organization that serves to promote and disseminate the artwork of contemporary artists.
Boniface has had numerous solo and joint exhibitions including the Kenya Art Fair, the Kenya National Theatre, Alliance Francaise, the Italian Institute of Culture, the UNHCR, the Circle Art Gallery – Lamu exhibitions, and the Nairobi National Museum. He has also exhibited through the Danish and Russian Embassy residences and at Glocal Art Gallery, Denmark.
Book Reading: Featured Book – Dust by Yvonne Adhiambo Owour, Jan. 21 2017 @ Pointzero Bookcafé
Date: January 21, 2017
Venue: Pointzero Bookcafé
Time: 11am – 2pm
Featured Book – Dust by Yvonne Adhiambo Owour
Nai Ni Who – City Centre Walking Tours, Every Sunday Until Aug. 21 2016 @ Nairobi CBD
Dates: Every Sunday – Until August 21, 2016
Venue: Nairobi Gallery (Tour A & B) and 7th August Memorial (Tour C)
Time: Morning Tour – 11 am and Afternoon Tour – 2 pm
About City Centre Walking Tours
Nai Ni Who city centre walking tours open city residents and visitors to the rich history of Downtown Nairobi – building, monuments, and captivating (hi)stories and geographies. The walks last about an hour, with tours A and B (Kenyatta Avenue and Parliament Road) beginning at the Nairobi Gallery and Tour C (River Road) starting at the 7th August Memorial
Exhibition + Performance: Sunday with Richard Onyango & Point Zero Jam, Mar. 13 – Sept. 2016 @ Nairobi Gallery
Richard Onyango’s Official Exhibition Launch;
Date: March 13, 2016
Venue: Nairobi Gallery
Entry: Free
Exhibition Runs Until: September 13, 2016
Entry: Normal Rates Apply
The gallery will also pay homage to the Late Expedito Mwebe Kibbula who passed away on 18 February 2016 at 64 years of age.
A special selection of works by this exceptionally talented and innovative multi-media artist will be on display in the main entrance.
About – Richard Onyango
Born in 1960, RICHARD ONYANGO – one of Kenya’s most prominent artists – is younger than the other pioneer artists whose works have been shown at the Nairobi Gallery. However, Onyango is noted for his “retrospective works”, i.e. painting scenes from Mombasa Old Town as he imagines it was in 1963 or the bus that took him to school in 1968.In fact, Onyango has had a fascination for buses and the brave new world of machines and vehicles of all kinds ever since he moved with his mechanic father from the Western highlands near Lake Victoria to the developing coastal region of Malindi. Using trash and scraps collected by street children, he even creates replicas of ferries, tractors and life-sized airplanes. Onyango confesses he always wanted to be a pilot, and the photo above shows him in the cockpit of one of his artistic creations.
As a young man in dusty cowboy boots, Onyango had many careers including driving, farming, carpentry, fashion designer, wood carver, sign painter, jazz musician and animal trainer, before he started painting at the age of twenty encouraged by some of the Italian supporters of the arts at Malindi and a local businessman and art collector, named Feisal Osman.
Having studied painting at the age of 16 he developed a vocabulary of “photo pictures” in his mind to which he still refers in his recent paintings. Later, as a young artist he met his European girl friend, a voluptuous Italian girl named Drosie and produced his most famous series of works on their brief love affair, which are like snapshots, or a slice of life during his more flamboyant days.
Onyango has a remarkable following from abroad. He had his first exhibition in the West in l992 which had generally good reviews. His paintings have been exhibited at the Venice Biennale in 2003, Africa Remix in 2005, in galleries and museums in the USA and UK, and in the contemporary African art collection (CAAC) In Geneva.
He still continues to live in Malindi.