CONTESTARTISTS
JM-QAFRI · 7 FEATURED ARTISTS
THE ARTISTS

A curated roster of visual artists from Kenya, across Africa, and one Russian voice working across print, oil, digital media, film, and emerging technologies — recognised and championed by JM-Qafri.

— PRIZE ALUMNI
GRAND PRIX
WINNERS
Amara Osei-Bonsu
GRAND PRIX 2025
Amara Osei-Bonsu
Accra, Ghana
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Atieno Otieno
GRAND PRIX 2024
Atieno Otieno
Nairobi, Kenya
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— THE ROSTER
ALL
ARTISTS
Amara Osei-Bonsu
Accra, Ghana · 2025
Amara Osei-Bonsu

Amara's work dissolves the boundary between the ancestral and the digital. Drawing from Akan textile patterns and re-weaving them through algorithmic processes, her pieces interrogate cultural memory in an age of synthetic reproduction.

DigitalMixed Media
Atieno Otieno
Nairobi, Kenya · 2024
Atieno Otieno

Atieno's work explores the intersection of memory and landscape. His photographs capture the quiet moments of fashion, revealing the complexity of urban existence.

OilPhotography
Anastasia Volkova
Saint Petersburg, Russia · 2023
Anastasia Volkova

Anastasia builds speculative structures that feel half-monument, half-memory. Her digital environments borrow from stage design, public architecture, and ceremonial objects, creating works that feel both futuristic and haunted by history.

3DCGISculpture
Seun Adeyemi
Lagos, Nigeria · 2023
Seun Adeyemi

Seun's lens is forensic. His documentary-style photography and short films capture Lagos in motion — the infrastructure of hustle, the choreography of survival. He was shortlisted for the JM-Qafri Prize in its inaugural year.

PhotographyFilm
Naledi Mokoena
Johannesburg, South Africa · 2024
Naledi Mokoena

Naledi's print practice draws from protest posters, township signage, and hand-cut stencil language. Her installations layer repetition with interruption, turning each edition into a record of movement, labor, and collective voice.

PrintInstallation
Kioni Waweru
Nairobi, Kenya · 2025
Kioni Waweru

Born and raised in Nairobi, Kioni's massive oil canvases channel the energy of East African street art while speaking the language of classical figuration. Her murals are landmarks; her studio work, intimate revelations.

OilMural
Wambui Njoroge
Nairobi, Kenya · 2026
Wambui Njoroge

Wambui works with machine learning as a cultural tool rather than a shortcut. Training systems on oral fragments, matatu graphics, and family archives, she builds digital pieces that ask who gets preserved, translated, and remembered.

AIDigital
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AN ARTIST?

JM-Qafri champions emerging and established artists from Kenya, across Africa, and the wider global conversation. Enter the 2026 Prize and join a roster shaped by regional memory, craft, and contemporary vision.

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© JM-Qafri Art Prize · Nairobi · Kisumu . Moscow , Saint Petersburg . 2026Print · Film · AI · 3D · CGI