One of the team, Stoneface Bombaa, grew up in Matare, the capital’s second largest informal settlement.
He overcame great odds to become an artist and wants to use his work to draw attention to how people in Mathare live – often lacking jobs, housing and education.
Bombaa says they survive on a “hand-to-mouth economy” not knowing where they will get their next meal.
“People are really angry,” he says, but through art he feels he can “channel” his community’s anger into something positive, because “art unites.”
Bombaa decided to create from exhibitions “microtopias” scattered throughout the city.
He called it the “jungle room” and hoped to get people to connect with nature from within Mathare itself in an attempt to bridge the ecological divide.
Ironically, the building he identified as a possible site was demolished by the authorities to make way for the road.
