Market Day, Gikomba, 1982. Linocut printed in black on paper.
Lot 11

Elias Thuo (1949–2011)

Market Day, Gikomba, 1982

Linocut printed in black on paper

45 × 60 cm · From the edition of 25

Estimate KES 70,000–110,000

Bidding

Current bid

KES 37,500

2 bids · Reserve not yet met

Time left

20m 07s

Closes 00:50

How bidding works

Bids · 2

  1. KES 37,500 Paddle 472 Online 00:10
  2. KES 35,000 Paddle 404 Online 00:01

About the work

The second-hand clothes market at Gikomba on a Saturday, a crowd of shoppers and sellers pressed between stalls hung with shirts. Every figure is cut with the same quick, confident line.

Condition

Good. A small repaired tear in the lower margin, well clear of the image.

Provenance

Private collection, Nairobi.

The artist

Thuo cut linoleum blocks of Nairobi's crowds for thirty years: matatus packed to the doors, the cloth stalls of Gikomba, queues at the bus station. He printed in black, sometimes with a single second colour, on a hand press in his house in Kaloleni, in editions that rarely went beyond thirty. His prints were sold for years from a table outside the post office on Moi Avenue.

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