Born in 1941 in Addis Ababa. Zerihun Yetmgeta studied at the Alle School of Fine Art and Design from 1963 to 1968. He shared a studio with Skunder Boghossian. Who was also his teacher and a big influence on his practice. He went on to teach at the academy from 1978. Unlike many artists he didn’t want to leave his country and chose to stay in Addis during the Derg regime. The regime had a huge impact on the flowering Ethiopian art scene. Subject matters were censored, and artists were forced to work in the social realist style in favour with communist regimes around the globe.

Zerihun’s practice revolves around the preservation of Ethiopian tradition and culture. A red thread and a big inspiration for his creative output is Ethiopian Orthodox Art. The abundant manuscripts and mural paintings created and kept throughout the country offer a wealth of visual and cultural inspirations for the artist. So much so that his studio follows the floor plan of an Ethiopian Church. Like Skunder Boghossian the magic scrolls hold a huge fascination for him. These scrolls are a traditional antidote used to ward off evil spirits and ensure protection against demons. Their intricate and geometric iconography and the beautiful colourful illuminations offer a wealth of visual inspiration. His art is heavily infused with symbolism, ancient superstitions, and taboos as well as religious symbols and iconography.  It is not just the Ethiopian orthodox culture that fascinates Zerihun, the pre-Aksumite Sabaean culture in the North of Ethiopia was another source of inspiration particularly the ancient traditions surrounding the worship of the Moon god. In Zerihuns work you can find symbols like the moon, sun and Ibis the male sun god. 

The painting is dated 1976. This was soon after the Derg had overthrown Haile Sellasie and his government and had taken over with their socialist regime. Many artists had left as they faced stringent restrictions and art was only to be made as propaganda in the social realist style. Zerihun stayed and kept working as an artist. Zerihun in his own words on the painting “Life on Jupiter” a work he painted a year earlier in 1975: It shows the tension and struggle under which everyone was living. When I painted this, the situation in Ethiopia was unbearable. I was imagining what life would be like on another planet. Zerihun kept a low profile and continued working without making much fanfare or using ambiguous titles and managed to stay his own course somehow. His paintings are known to have hidden meanings and the one should be able to read the symbols ones their meaning is known...