Kura Shomali

Kura Shomali’s work is instantly recognizable for its dynamic lines, ink splashes, and vibrant energy, reflecting the bustling, chaotic life of Kinshasa that inspires him at every turn. His practice captures the city’s rhythm and disorder, translating its sounds, movements, and textures into vivid, layered visual compositions. Although he has experimented with video, installations, puppetry, and found materials, Shomali ultimately refined his signature style through drawing. Working primarily on paper, he combines gouache, ink, felt-tip pens, charcoal, and collage, creating pieces with distinctive textures and a lively, expressive quality. His early drawings, made with urgency and immediacy, drew inspiration from the circulation of hand-to-hand magazines and the energetic pulse of the city, embodying Kinshasa’s vibrant megacity life. In recent works, Shomali reinterprets iconic images from African photographers such as Samuel Fosso, Malick Sidibé, and Jean Depara, infusing them with humor and a contemporary perspective. He also continues to create puppets from found objects, animating them in videos to comment on corruption, conflict, and social issues, blending critique with playfulness. Across the media, his work combines spontaneity, satire, and observation to portray the vitality, contradictions, and resilience of contemporary Congolese life. ...