Njogu Kuria’s life-sized sculptural work titled The Avatar is a new step in his engagement with recycled materials.
The piece, which is currently grabbing attention at the Sarit Centre, Nairobi, is made of metal and rubber.
It has come a long way since Kuria first began experimenting with rubber in 2023. In the previous years, he worked with vinyl records to create portraits before transitioning into three-dimensional forms, finding himself drawn to the black essence of both his vinyl records and sculptural works.
Black rubber, from recycled tyres and inner tubes, presented a new material which was also easy to collect from local motorcycle, bicycle, and car garages. Rubber as a sculptural material presented new opportunities and challenges.
“Tyres are built to survive harsh weather, impact, and friction. It is a highly flexible and easy-to-manipulate material, either through cutting to the desired shapes and forms,” he says.
As a result, it gives sculptures more fluid, curvy, organic, and muscular forms. He explains that the challenge is learning how to get the desired outcome from the various shapes and cuts.
The Avatar came from his ongoing curiosity about how human identity is constantly being shaped, distorted, and reconstructed by the environments people move through. He wanted to create a figure that felt familiar and alien at the same time, with rubber being the best medium for this because of its limitless flexibility to be transformed.
Kuria says the idea for The Avatar started as a study of spirits: the energies, histories, and invisible forces that influence everyday life.
“The Avatar stands as a messenger from the ancients. The materials speak to recycling discarded resources and histories. The upright posture communicates resilience and readiness,” he says.
The Avatar will be on view until The Art Happening event scheduled for December 12-16 at the Sarit Expo Centre.
There, the piece is expected to be auctioned through sealed envelopes, and the highest bidder will take it home. The event is meant to celebrate the first quarter of the millennium.