Kimathi Mafafo is a multidisciplinary artist whose practise ranges from embroidery, oil painting to installation. Born in the semi-arid Kimberley, Mafafo questions historical stereotypes around gender inequality in Africa. She primarily focuses on celebrating Black women, placing them in often verdant scenes characterised by lush greenery and sensuous drapery, far removed from the dusty mining town where she grew up. Her work creates a tension between becoming and being, concealing and revealing, retreating and showing up, all of which are an embodiment of the arduous negotiations Black women have to make in navigating their existence in society.

Mafafo has participated in several solo shows and featured in many group exhibitions in South Africa as well as in the USA, France and Turkey.