KKBEKOE. | East London Artist

KIRSTY BEKOE-TABIRI.

Artist and Cultural Experience Designer based in East London

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I make art and experiences rooted in community, beautiful things, and where I come from.

COLLABS

2024.

RESCRIPTED.

I exhibited eight works at Yahoo! UK as part of their Black History Month showcase, alongside delivering a keynote talk. My speech explored how traditionally feminine traits can drive social change just as much as masculine ones, connecting these ideas to the themes in my paintings.

2025.

LOVE'S REPLY.

For Theatre Royal Stratford East's "Romeo and Juliet," I ran workshops for East Londoners across varied English levels (non-verbal, learner, and fluent). Using fragments of Shakespeare's script, we created and exchanged reflections on love using art as a shared language. The works were exhibited in the theatre alongside the production.

2025.

THE FUTURE IS SOFT HERE.

Over seven months, I led a co-creation project with young people in Barking, East London. Together we chose to tackle themes of existential dread, agency, and the future, moving from experimentation to the collaborative planning and execution of large canvases. The group shaped the concepts, compositions, final forms, names and final exhibition.

2021.

REWORKS.

As part of a group of makers in Barking, East London, I helped transform exhibition waste from the Victoria and Albert Museum into furniture stools. The project explored cycles of reuse and sustainability, while questioning who gets to be displayed, and how craft and art intersect. The finished stools were both exhibited and used within the museum itself.

SWIPE >

2024.

kingpin.

medium: OIL ON CANVAS with gold and silver leaf, 50 x 75 cm

should I close these eyes

I'd be with you now;

but I can’t.

the city doesn't sleep.

EXHIBITIONS

The 8th Women in Art Prize Exhibition, 67 York Street Gallery, London (2025)

AWARDS

First Runner-Up, Susan Angoy Prize

for Artists of African and

Caribbean Heritage (2025)

2024.

ST GEORGE.

medium: OIL ON CANVAS with gold leaf, 75 x 100 cm

these words are a psalm;

there's no need to shout

I whisper them softly til

you fade away.

EXHIBITIONS

Moonlight Exhibition, FUSEBOX, London (2025)

2024.

Glass.

medium: OIL ON CANVAS with silver leaf, 30 x 40 cm

twinkling, fragile; cold

to the touch-

this skyscraper has no ceiling.

EXHIBITIONS

Rescripted: Black History Month Showcase, Yahoo! UK, London (2024)

•Delivered keynote talk on how traditionally feminine traits shape social change, in dialogue with my exhibited work.

2024.

petrol.

medium: OIL ON CANVAS with bronze leaf, 60 x 30 cm

a palm-sized cup

and a sky full of stars;

both flow over.

Key solo works.

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originals.

prints.

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BROWSE.

ABOUT.

I make art and experiences rooted in community, beautiful things, and where I'm from.

My practice spans oil painting, fine art print editions, and participatory cultural programming. I move between the intimate and the institutional, from small group workshops to gallery commissions and cultural events.

The paintings are figurative. Black women in bespoke fashion, set against London cityscapes and diasporic landscapes. Adinkra symbols run through the work: each one a Ghanaian proverb. I use these symbols alongside ones of my own making; new parables for urban experiences and inheritances found in London. The work is about inheritance, sovereignty, and self-presentation as a profound and celebratory act.

The experiences bring people into contact with that world directly: through making, gathering, and communal reflection.

I am based in East London and hold a BA and MPhil in Architecture and Urban Design from Cambridge.

My work has been supported by Arts Council England and recognised by the Susan Angoy Prize for Artists of African and Caribbean Heritage.

I have worked in partnership with: