Lot 34

Samuel Githui (Kenyan, born 1973)
Market Scene, 1996
Signed ‘S/GITHUI 96’ (lower right) and ‘S GITHUI’ (verso)
Oil on canvas
46 x 81.6 cm
US$ 2,000 – 3,000
Provenance: from the artist’s collection
Sold US$ 2,113

Born in 1973, Samuel Githui has been drawing from a young age, since he was about five or six years old. He has always paid close attention to his surroundings, and his impressions of the spaces, people and events around him are the material for his artwork. Githui relies on his observation of typical events to investigate societal shifts, politics, and the lives of people working to make their place in a world that does not always work in their favour.
In Market Scene 1996, Githui depicts the busyness of a market day, a coming together of his time as an artist at the Kuona Trust Museum Art Studio, while also working as a fruit vendor to supplement his income. This is the artist’s first painting on canvas.

Githui has exhibited widely throughout East Africa as well as in Germany and Italy, and is represented in both private and institutional collections.