Kyambi’s practice probes issues of race, perception, gender and memory. Her work examines how contemporary human experience is influenced by constructed histories, creating installations that include a performative practice to narrate stories and activate objects, exploring cultural identities, linking them to issues of loss, memory, race, and gender.
Based in Nairobi and of Kenyan and German origin, Syowia Kyambi has received commissions by the Kenya Institute of Administration, the National Museum of Kenya and the Art 4 Action Foundation in Kenya. She is an alumnus of the School of the Art Institute of Chicago and has been the recipient of several awards and grants, including most recently the Smithsonian Artist Research Fellowship, being shortlisted for the Financial Times Emerging Artist Award and recipient of the Art in Global Health Grant from the Wellcome Trust Fund in the United Kingdom.
Her work has been exhibited in museums in Belgium, Finland, Kenya, Mali, Sweden, Germany, Zimbabwe, France, United Kingdom, Mexico, South Africa North America and Ireland
