Cyrus Kabiru

Cyrus Kabiru (b. in 1984, Nairobi, Kenya) lives and works in Nairobi, Kenya.

Cyrus Kabiru is a self-taught sculptor, who has exhibited frequently both internationally and on the African Continent. Kabiru has been a resident artist at the Africa First Residency by Serge Tiroche in collaboration with START incubator project in Israel in 2019;  Zeitz Museum of Contemporary Art Africa (MOCAA) Artist in Residency Programme at the Segera Retreat in Laikipia, Kenya in 2018 and the Fundació Han Nefkens in Barcelona, Spain in 2016. Kabiru has been the recipient of the Quartz Africa Innovators recognition at Quartz Africa’s Innovators Summit in Nairobi, Kenya in 2016; the Maker Faire Africa Award for Best Artist Innovation – Thinking Outside the Box in 2010 and in 2007 was awarded the Young Innovator Award by the Sandbox Network, in London, UK.

Kabiru has presented talks and workshops the world over. Most recently Comparative Futurisms | Afro-Asian Perspectives, as part of Art Basel in Hong Kong, China in 2019; Re-Visioning Arica Through the Creative Lenswith Cyrus Kabiru  at the Smithsonian National Museum of African Art in Washington DC, USA in 2018, as well as“The Young. The Wise. The Undiscovered” at the TED Talk Conference in Los Angeles, USA in 2013.

Notable solo presentations include: an upcoming solo exhibition with SMAC Gallery in Cape Town South Africa in 2019; a presentation with SMAC Gallery at ART X Lagos in Lagos, Nigeria, in 2018; two solo exhibitions, Macho Mbadala in Johannesburg and Pandashukain Cape Town, both at SMAC Gallery in 2017; Njia Ya Maishaas part of The Amory Show: African Perspectives, in New York City, USA; Black Mambaat the FNB Joburg Art Fair in Johannesburg, South Africa; The End Of The Black Mamba at the LOOP Fair in Barcelona, Spain, both in 2015; Cyrus Kabiruat Kuntspodium T Gallery in Tilburg, Netherlands, in 2011 and another self titled exhibition at the Rahimtulla Museum of Modern Arts (RaMoMA) in Nairobi, Kenya, in 2009.

Selected group exhibitions include Material Insanityat MACAAL in Marrakech, Morocco and, KUBATANA, at Vestfossen Kunstlaboratorium in Vestfossen, Norway, both in 2019; the fourth edition of the  Kochi-Muziris Biennale in Kochi, India in 2018; All Things Being Equal, at Zeitz Museum of Contemporary Art Africa (MOCAA) in Cape Town, South Africa, in 2017;  Making Africa – A Continent of Contemporary Design, a travelling exhibition curated by Amelie Klein with Okwui Enwezor, at the Vitra Design Museum in Weil am Rhein, Germany in 2015, later shown at The Guggenheim Museum in Bilbao, Spain and selected museums in the USA; Brutal Beauty: Violence and Contemporary Designat the MARTA Herford Museum of Contemporary Art in Herford, Germany in 2016; Lumières d’Afriques, at the Théâtre National de Chaillot in Paris, France; AFRICA – Architecture & Identityat the Louisiana Museum in Humlebæk, Denmark;Beyond Borders, the 5th edition of the Beaufort Triennial in West Flanders, Belgium; andUnorthodox,curated by Jens Hoffmann, at The Jewish Museum in New York City, USA, all in 2015.

Cyrus Kabiru’s work is included in numerous public and private collections, including: the Zeitz Museum of Contemporary Art Africa (MOCAA) permanent collection in Cape Town, South Africa; the Studio Museum in Harlem permanent collection, in New York City, USA; the Lemaître Collection, in Paris, France; the Han Nefkens H+F Collection, in Rotterdam, Netherlands; Kuona Trust, in Nairobi, Kenya; Scheryn Art Fund, in Cape Town, South Africa; and the Tiroche DeLeon Collection in Gibraltar, amongst others.