# Moke artist context and auction value notes

Canonical page: https://appraisily.com/artist/moke/
Profile generated: 2026-08-24T12:58:37.721Z
Quality: high confidence, strong sources

## Artist identity

- Death date: 2001-09-26
- Nationality: Congolese, Democratic Republic of the Congo
- Movements: Congolese popular painting, Postcolonial Kinshasa urban art
- Common media: Painting, Early pictures painted on discarded cardboard

## About Moke

Moke, commonly rendered Moké, was a Congolese painter born in Ibe in 1950. His documented name was Monsengwo Kejwamfi. After moving to Kinshasa as a teenager, he developed his career within the city's community of self-taught commercial and popular painters. By the 1970s, he had become a leading figure in Congolese popular painting, using the modern city as his principal subject. His pictures record crowded intersections, nightlife, outdoor bars, music, leisure, political gatherings, and other features of Kinshasa's public life. Documentary photography, particularly the work of Jean Dapara, informed his attention to social activity and urban observation. Early in his career, Moké made landscape pictures on discarded cardboard; later dated paintings include scenes such as Kinshasa at Noon and Long Live Utex Africa. Collectors encounter his work as vivid visual evidence of postcolonial Kinshasa and as part of the broader history of modern Congolese popular painting.

## Common works and media

The documented body of work consists primarily of paintings. Common subjects include Kinshasa street life, busy intersections, nightlife, bars, music performances, leisure scenes, political rallies, and public gatherings. Early pictures on discarded cardboard are also documented. Works attributed to the artist should be matched carefully across the names Moke, Moké, and Monsengwo Kejwamfi.

## Market and appraisal context

Appraisal of a work catalogued as Moke should first reconcile the name with the accented form Moké and the documented name Monsengwo Kejwamfi. The strongest available context identifies paintings, including early pictures on cardboard and dated urban scenes of Kinshasa. Relevant comparisons should therefore be filtered by work type or support, subject, and date rather than treating every record under the name as equivalent. The source pack indicates 83 associated Appraisily auction records, but it does not expose lot-level descriptions, dimensions, condition, provenance, estimates, or realized prices. Those records should be reviewed directly before drawing any price conclusion, and no market trend can be inferred from the present identity sources alone.

## Appraisily data basis

Appraisily artist pages combine public artist-identity research with auction records, auction-house context, sale dates, realized prices, and comparable lots when those records are available. Identity and market evidence are kept distinct so that biographical confidence does not imply a price conclusion.

## Sources

- The Museum of Modern Art: https://www.moma.org/artists/75467
- IdRef: https://www.idref.fr/081253788
- IdRef: https://www.idref.fr/284166553
- VIAF: https://viaf.org/viaf/96560092/
- Wikidata: https://www.wikidata.org/wiki/Q16267842
- Getty Vocabulary Program: https://vocab.getty.edu/page/ulan/500118559
- Appraisily: https://appraisily.com/artist/moke/