Meet Jim

In 2014, Jim co-founded The Nest Collective—a multidisciplinary art collective based in Nairobi, Kenya that has created works in film, music, fashion, visual arts and literature such as the critically-acclaimed queer anthology film Stories of Our Lives, which was banned in Kenya for ‘promoting homosexuality’. The film won the Jury Prize at the 2015 Berlinale Teddy Awards and— despite the ongoing ban in the country—has gone on to screen in more than 90 countries.

Jim co-founded HEVA in 2015, a fund that invests in the East African creative economy sector. Since its inception, HEVA has invested more than $3 million in creative businesses, innovated financial models specifically for the region, created networking, exchange and training opportunities for young entrepreneurs and pushed for policy and legal reforms to improve the sector.

As part of the Nest Collective, Jim co-created the International Inventories Programme (IIP), an international research and database project investigating the presence of Kenyan cultural objects in institutions across the globe. Between 2018-2021, the project catalogued an inventory of more than 32,000 objects, and engaged varying publics on the urgent debates of object movement and colonial history. Jim became a TED Fellow in 2021, and delivered a TED talk titled 'Why are stolen African artifacts still in Western museums?'.

Jim exited the Nest Collective and HEVA in 2021 to return to his personal practice, which currently includes producing and performing music as himself and as part of Just a Band, and co-producing Fight for Food—a documentary film about food production in Kenya.