Fabian Mpagi
Maskirade (sic) Fetish
About the SessionNAIROBI – Following their successful collaboration in 2025, Strauss & Co, Africa’s leading auction house, and Danda Jaroljmek, Director of Art Auction East Africa, will present Art Auction East Africa | Strauss & Co, a 67-lot sale bringing together modern and contemporary art from East Africa and the wider continent. The live-virtual sale will be held at Circle Art Gallery in Nairobi on Wednesday, 28 October, 2026, 7pm EAT. The catalogue spans a diversity of East African countries, including Kenya, Tanzania, Ethiopia, Sudan and Uganda, alongside works by artists from Angola, the Democratic Republic of Congo, Mozambique and Nigeria. Works on paper, photography and sculpture complements the strong painting consignment. “The selection invites collectors to discover East Africa’s diverse modernist histories, particularly those beyond the Anglophone world,” says Susie Goodman. “In recent years, there has been a resurgence of interest in East African modernists, with artists associated with the Khartoum School shown in museums and fairs globally. Our work as an auction house rooted in Africa is ensuring this rediscovery is not temporary. We are delighted to partner with Danda Jaroljmek in cultivating a sustainable secondary market for East African modernists active during the era of decolonisation and independence.” A preview exhibition will be held at Circle Art Gallery, Victoria Square, Riara Road, Nairobi, during the two weeks preceding the auction on Wednesday, 28 October 2026.
LOT 52
Fabian Mpagi
Maskirade (sic) Fetish
About this Item
signed and dated 96; inscribed with the artist's name, the date and the title on the reverse
Provenance
Private Collection.
Notes
An astute draughtsman with a delicate touch, Fabian Mpagi is recognised as one of Uganda’s most refined painters. Using rhythmic chromatic difference, Mpagi’s paintings create a sense of both shattered light and imaginative space. He was influenced by traditional Buganda fables, particularly the legendary creation myth of Kintu and Nnambi, and strove with his use of colour to evoke their mystery. In a 1994 interview, Mpagi explains, “my interest was in the universal concerns of man – both pleasure and pain – so I studied the hidden values of spiritual abstraction.”
After graduating from the Margaret Trowell School of Industrial and Fine Art in Kampala in 1976, Mpagi returned to the university as a postgraduate student and teaching assistant. In 1983 he received a scholarship to study in Florence, Italy. Upon his return, Mpagi went into political exile in Kenya, where he set up a studio and his artistic career flourished. He won the Habitat Art Competition in 1987 and was awarded a four-month artist residency in Paris. The following year Mpagi returned to Uganda and shortly after became the director of the Nommo Gallery, from which he eventually resigned in 1998 in order to devote time to his art.
Biography courtesy of Circle Art Gallery.
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