Jua Paa House Artist Residency
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The Revival Residency June 2026
Shabu Mwangi
Irene Wanjiru
Ngugi Waweru
Zihan Kassam
Notice at the entrance of our Walk-Through on June 19, 2026. Welcome to the first residency. Welcome to Jua Paa. This month marks the beginning of a new chapter. During your visit, you will be welcomed by our house manager, Kahindi, who lived here for many years with the late artist Yony Waite and now continues to care for the house alongside us. Kahindi has been part of the life of Jua Paa for decades and carries with him countless memories and a deep knowledge of this place and its history. If you have questions about the house, its past, or the many people who have passed through it over the years, we encourage you to spend some time with him. This is the inaugural residency following the passing of Yony Waite, whose presence, generosity and imagination shaped this house for decades. Before the forthcoming renovations begin, we wanted to gather once more within these walls much as Yony left them, lived in, loved and alive with stories. Yony was an artist, environmentalist and cultural visionary whose commitment to Lamu extended far beyond her own practice. Through her work, her hospitality and her belief in the transformative power of art, she created spaces where people could meet, think, make and imagine together. Her influence continues to ripple through the cultural life of Lamu and far beyond its shores. For the past few weeks, the artists gathered here have worked in conversation with the house, its history and one another. Together, Irene Wanjiru, Ngugi Waweru, Shabu Mwangi and Zihan Kassam have created paintings, sculptures and memorial installations that respond not only to place, but also to memory, continuity and renewal. We are honoured to welcome four accomplished artists whose practices have helped shape contemporary art in Kenya. Shabu Mwangi and Ngugi Waweru are co-founders of the Wajukuu Art Project in Mukuru, Nairobi, an artist-led collective that has become internationally recognised for its commitment to community, education and socially engaged practice. Through Wajukuu, they have helped create opportunities for generations of young artists while building one of East Africa’s most significant grassroots cultural initiatives. Irene Wanjiru is a pioneering sculptor whose multidisciplinary practice moves fluidly between stone, wood, fabric, paper mâché and printmaking. Her work demonstrates a rare sensitivity to material and form, expanding the possibilities of sculpture through both traditional and experimental approaches. This residency has been led by artist andarts writer Zihan Kassam, whose work centres on documenting artists and exploring creative practice through a psychological and human-centred lens. Her engagement with Kenyan contemporary art spans painting, writing, research and curating exhibitions for Marula Green Market. She recently co-authored Echoes of Humanity with Red Hill Art Gallery and contributed to a forthcoming publication on the artist Jürgen Leippert, published by art patron Herbert Menzer. In recent months, Zihan has been documenting conversations with Yony Waite’s friends, neighbours and collaborators across Lamu, gathering stories and memories for a growing archive dedicated to her life and legacy. Jua Paa was first and foremost Yony’s home. Over the years it became something more, a refuge for artists, writers and thinkers from Kenya and around the world. Alongside it stands the remarkable Wildebeeste Gallery, one of Lamu’s most important cultural spaces, where exhibitions, workshops and conversations unfolded across generations. This residency exists to honour and continue Yony’s legacy. As one of the longest-running artist residency spaces in Lamu, we hope it will remain a place where creativity, exchange and experimentation can flourish for many years to come. More than that, we hope it can play a small but meaningful role in the future of East African art, supporting artists in their journeys, fostering new conversations and creating the conditions for ambitious and thoughtful work to emerge. For now, we invite you simply to wander. Spend time with the works. Move through the rooms. Notice the traces of a life deeply lived. Say hello to our photographer Jerry Riley, enjoy a few snacks, a conversation, a moment of reflection and the pleasure of seeing this place alive once again. Today is intentionally modest, a small gathering to mark a meaningful return. Karibuni Jua Paa
Irene with her large sculpture
Irene's sculpture at the Anima Show by MGM in Nairobi
Irene with her large sculpture
Irene Wanjiru
Few artists command a material quite like pioneering Kenyan sculptor Irene Wanjiru. At Jua Paa House, we have been incredibly fortunate to witness her painstaking process unfold day by day.
Her remarkable creatures have transformed the ground floor, each sculpture possessing its own distinct personality while together creating a striking, almost mythical presence within the house.Working instinctively across stone, wood, papier-mâché, fabric and found materials, Irene allows each medium to reveal its own possibilities.
Each sculpture emerges through a process of close observation, persistence and responsiveness to the material itself. Watching her work slowly take shape beneath her hands has been one of the privileges of life at Jua Paa House, while seeing fellow artists engage with her methods and materials has made her process part of the residency itself.
Over the course of her career, Irene has exhibited widely in Kenya and internationally. She has completed multiple artist residencies at the Carving Studio & Sculpture Center in Rutland, Vermont, was the 2015 artist-in-residence at the Spillway Fund in Maine, and has undertaken major public commissions, including a monumental sculpture for CARE International’s headquarters in Atlanta.
Zihan Herr
Zihan Herr
Remote Series I
Remote Series II
Zihan Herr
Zihan Herr’s practice spans painting, research, art writing and exhibition making. Herr has written on contemporary art for publications including The Star and The Nation newspapers before expanding to several international platforms. She continues to write about and work with many of Kenya’s leading contemporary artists, galleries and institutions.
Her writing has included catalogues for Circle Art Gallery, the Lamu Painters Festival, the Marula Green Market exhibitions and numerous independent exhibitions. She is the co author of Echoes of Humanity, published with Red Hill Art Gallery, and has contributed to several other books on contemporary art. Her particular strength lies in immersive research, spending extended periods interviewing, observing and living alongside artists, often producing the first critical profiles of their work.
For the past seven years, Herr has worked closely with the Olooseos team, constructing pop up exhibitions, curating thematic shows at the MGM and helping shape its artistic vision. As Jua Paa House’s in house curator and residency facilitator, she works alongside artists through dialogue and research, supporting contemporary practice and encouraging work that challenges dominant narratives.
Herr’s artistic practice has evolved towards figurative painting. Through painting and writing, she explores the power of narrative to shape identity, livelihoods, reputations and political realities. While taking a university course in social psychology, Herr developed a stronger framework for observing and understanding human behaviour, an influence that continues to inform the social commentary embedded in her artistic practice. Approaching her practice through a psychological lens, she examines how identities are constructed through the perceptions and narratives of others, with a particular interest in projection, mythmaking and the fabrication of reputation.
Herr’s current body of work explores the experience of misrepresentation and the social violence of rumour before expanding to the colonial narratives that continue to influence cultural life in Kenya and, ultimately, to the narratives that justify war, shape power and influence the belief systems through which societies understand themselves. Across painting, writing and curating, her practice is driven by a commitment to expanding artistic discourse and creating spaces where audiences can engage critically with the stories that shape society.
Ngugi Waweru
As a self-taught artist, I have learned from the environment, a community of artists, and from society. My work connects to community learning practices in art, including woodblock prints, art of collective movements in Asia, China, Africa, Latin America also in Europe and North America. Connecting art, social and political movements fighting for freedom, equality, solidarity, justice, fighting colonialism and supporting decolonization. My practice is part of the movement and informal school of training. Followed by me and my fellow artist founding Wajukuu artist collective, supporting each other with shred knowledge, becoming a teacher, mentor and supporter, connecting internationally with other artists, artists collective and their community leading to documenta 15 and winning Arnold Bode Award as a collective.
My artistic practice is an intuitive and interdisciplinary exploration of memory, material and meaning. Rooted in lived experience, ancestral wisdom, and environmental consciousness, my work traverses the emotional landscapes of longing, fragility and resilience. Drawing from African proverbs, social histories and spiritual inquiries, I engage with questions of identity, justice and healing in a world shaped by violence, colonization and climate collapse. Through installations, paintings, sculptures and hand made prints, I reclaim discarded materials such as worn-out knives, corrugated iron sheets, motorcycle chains, infusing them with renewed life and symbolic weight. My practice critiques systems of power while honoring the transformative potential of community, spirituality and the human.
My time at the Jua Paa Art Residency was both deeply productive and personally enriching. Beyond creating new artworks, it offered a rare opportunity to slow down and prioritize self-care. The peaceful environment, welcoming home and positive energy of the space encouraged me to spend time fasting, meditating and reflecting, allowing me to reconnect with myself while nurturing my creative practice. At the same time, I enjoyed moments of relaxation, meaningful conversations and shared experiences with fellow residents, making the residency both inspiring and joyful. The experience culminated in an open studio presentation, where I had the opportunity to share my work with invited visitors, engage in thoughtful discussions about my practice and receive valuable feedback that will continue to inform my artistic journey.
Shabu Mwangi
Shabu' shares his latest installation at The Great Repair exhibition. Visit Munyu Space.
The earth does not scream.
It bleeds slowly,
And we have mistaken its silence,
For permission and emptiness as an inheritance.
Lawrence Mwangi (Shabu) is a Kenyan visual artist and the director of Wajukuu Art Project, a community-based arts initiative in Mukuru, Nairobi. His practice spans painting, sculpture and installation, drawing from lived experiences.
His work explores memory, displacement, environmental change and social inequality, using found materials and poetic symbolism to reflect on the relationship between people, place and collective history.
Alongside his artistic practice, Shabu is dedicated to community development through arts education, cultural exchange and collaborative projects, believing that art can inspire dialogue, resilience and social transformation.
The greatest joy arrives with a quiet sense of accomplishment, the serenity that sustains it. It is a familiar reminder that freedom is never merely found it is created, nurtured and continuously maintained through our choices, and our shared humanity.
That was the spark I carried throughout the three weeks I spent at Jua Paa alongside my fellow artists. The feeling was than a gathering of creative minds, it became a reunion of familiar space where conversations, silence and creation intertwined, reaffirming our faith in one another each day, In that shared rhythm, hope became something tangible, living between us.
I left not only with works of art, but with a grounded sense of family connection with my fellow artist, it was a home where everyone could learn from the space itself and the spirit it carries.