Otobong Nkanga

Otobong Nkanga (b. 1974, Kano, Nigeria) lives and works in Antwerp, Belgium. Her artistic practice includes drawing, installation, textile work, photography, sculpture, and performance.

Nkanga explores the complexities of human influenceand presence in nature as well as in the global economy. She traces the vestiges of trade in raw materials and how goods and people circulate the world in different ways and on different premises. Nkanga is concerned with manufacture and how mining and other forms of extraction leave irreversible traces on the landscape.

Her work highlights both the effects this has on peopleand nature, but also how dependent the world is on the circulation of goods.

In Nkanga’s art, themes are often framed in poeticlanguage, and her titles are central to the understanding of the work. Full of literary, religious, and geological references, they reflect the works’ thematic complexity.

Uncertain Where the Next Wind Blows is Nkanga’s first exhibition in Norway. It contains approximately 70 works and site-specific installations, spanning from 2003 to 2020.

The tapestries, After We Are Gone (2020) and Revelations (2020) are presented for the first time, and the latter is now a part of the Henie Onstad Collection.

The exhibition is presented as part of The Lise Wilhelmsen Art Award Programme at Henie Onstad Kunstsenter.

Henie Onstad would like to thank the A. Wilhelmsen family, Otobong Nkanga, Wim van Dongen, the jury, Göteborgs Konsthall, all private lenders, and the galleries Lumen Travo Gallery, In Situ - Fabienne Leclerc and Mendes Wood DM for their for their generous support of the exhibition.