Beatrice Wanjiku

"My paintings challenge one to look beyond the

surface through the exposure of their hidden

stories."

Beatrice Wanjiku, who was awarded the “Most Promising Female Artist”

title in Kenya in 2006, has now become an internationally lauded artist.

Her work displays emotional richness and requires full engagement of the

viewer’s mind and soul.

Beatrice's paintings play with the processes of revealing and concealing. She explores themes of vanity, humanity, memories and transitions, by playing

with layering, texture and typography and using key texts lifted from

magazines, novels, and newspapers.

The contrast between abstraction, text, montage and layering and the image

of the face on several of her paintings is to explore the notion of the self

through the perception of the other. The face as the final layer gives something recognizable to the viewer, a point of clear identification rooting the play of

words and ideas in the physical human form and our most immediate

expression of the self, the face.

Beatrice has participated in various group and solo exhibitions in Kenya and abroad; including in the US and the UK. Her work has been acknowledged by various awards and scholarships.