Meet the onion, it’s soft but can make you weep

Peterson Kamwathi is showing prints; a series of woodcuts plus a couple of aquatints; a wonderfully grainy medium.

He learnt the technique in the UK, during a residency in Bath and London, and they feature two British icons — a pigeon and a postage stamp.

Drawn with a flourish yet retaining a high level of sensitivity, Kamwathi’s pigeons are witty creations, although I have to state (to save my head from being chopped off) that his portrait of Queen Elizabeth on the stamp shows Her Majesty looking uncharacteristically grim.

The woodcuts are even sterner stuff.

They are from a series entitled Nchi Yetu (our country), and those familiar with Kamwathi’s work would be entitled to conclude they offer a polemical view of the state of Kenya.

Each is of a bull, or maybe a cash cow, elegantly drawn, made up of coffins (representing death), barcodes (commerce, possibly plunder), and bank notes (perhaps corruption.)

On one level these prints offer an objective look at common things we see around us; on another, symbols that provide a damning indictment of current affairs.

Other pictures on show include a set of small heads by Richard Kimathi.

Within the stylised faces of the oils, the eyes and mouths have been cut out from magazine photographs; in a group of acrylics the faces have been deliberately dehumanised to look almost like Avatars.

They are not pretty. They are even disturbing. Yet together, oddly compelling.

Frank Whalley runs Lenga Juu, a fine arts and media consultancy based in Nairobi. Email: fwhalley@gmail.com