Between Hope and Despair responds to Kenya’s 2022 general election by reflecting on the unresolved trauma of the 2007–2008 post-election violence, which left over 2,000 dead and displaced more than 600,000 people. The work examines how memory, history, and political cycles intersect—where citizens’ hopes for change often collide with the self-interest of political elites, and where selective amnesia risks repeating past violence.

Through a layered composition of photographic imagery and image-transferred newspaper clippings from previous elections, mounted on canvas, the piece evokes a surreal déjà vu—suggesting that history lingers just beneath the surface of the present. Figurative oil paintings of voters queuing at the ballot box convey the tension, uncertainty, and collective anxiety surrounding electoral moments. Between Hope and Despair memorializes the fragile space between democratic aspiration and political disillusionment, probing the emotional residue of national trauma and the ongoing search for a more just political future.