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INSIGHT: Week 15 | Chemu Ng'ok

Past viewing_room
14 - 20 October 2020
  • INSIGHT: Week 15 | Chemu Ng'ok

  • INSIGHT IS A NEW ONLINE PLATFORM PRESENTED BY PIPPY HOULDSWORTH GALLERY, DEBUTING WORK BY A DIFFERENT ARTIST EACH WEEK. NEW WORK MADE DURING LOCKDOWN WILL BE HIGHLIGHTED ALONGSIDE A SHORT VIDEO PRESENTED BY THE ARTIST.

  • INSIGHT: WEEK 15 | CHEMU NG'OK

  • Chemu Ng'ok's painting practice explores the power dynamics of human interaction and visualises its effects on the psyche. From individual encounters to relationships created across communities, she paints bodies that multiply in number and shift in scale. These solidify and dissolve as they interact with one another across the canvas. Using bold swathes of colour, thin washes of paint, and wavering fine lines, Ng'ok characterises her forms with a restlessness that visualises the permeable line between public and private, personal and political. The artist draws on personal experience as a black, Kenyan woman, as well as the broader political landscape, encompassing contemporary politics in Nairobi and the longstanding legacy of colonialism. Though the figures of her paintings often draw inspiration from particular people and events, Ng'ok is more interested in the symbolic nature of power. Her imagery evokes a dreamlike atmosphere, where invisible relationships and psychological tensions - forces that imperceptibly shape our reality - take physical form.

  • 'In Ng’ok’s depictions, the bodies of “rioters” are propelled by emotional energy toward something beyond the frame of the painting, though they are not always in complete unison; in paintings of small groups or singular figures, unruly fields of color bleed into and take from each other – signaling the flows of political and intellectual ideas that mobilize us into action.'

    M. Neelika Jayawardane, '2018 Triennial: Songs For Sabotage', New Museum, New York

  • THE HEART OF THE MATTER, 2020 oil on canvas 110 x 150 cm, 43 1/4 x 59 1/8 in POA...

    THE HEART OF THE MATTER, 2020

    oil on canvas
    110 x 150 cm, 43 1/4 x 59 1/8 in

    POA

     

    The Heart of the Matter presents a scene of crowds gathering in protest and holding up placards. The image is framed with military figures - soldiers dressed in camouflage, alone and gathered in groups - whilst in the centre stands a male lawyer dressed for court. Ng'ok's undulating lines, application of colour, and use of scale creates fluid movement across the painting. Within the layered composition, where figure and ground move back and forth, the artist reflects on the manifestation of power, the relationship between people and the state, and possibilities for self-determination. The Heart of the Matter belongs to a new body of work that draws on the aftermath of the 2007 and 2017 Kenyan elections. Reflecting on a nullified vote, increased military presence, and protests met with violence, Ng'ok expresses the psychological effects of history in the present moment, exploring contemporary hopes and anxieties.  

    Enquire
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    • Soliders
    • Soliders 3
    • Soliders 2
  • 'By combining scenes of conflict and comfort Ng'ok builds intricate psychological portraits that reveal the complexities of societal expectations, all visualised in riotous colour and nimble brushwork.'

    Holly Black, Elephant Magazine, 2020

  • Chemu Ng'ok, Untitled, 2020 (Larger version of this image opens in a popup).
    Chemu Ng'ok, Untitled, 2020 (Larger version of this image opens in a popup).
    Chemu Ng'ok, Untitled, 2020 (Larger version of this image opens in a popup).
    Chemu Ng'ok, Untitled, 2020 (Larger version of this image opens in a popup).
    Chemu Ng'ok, Untitled, 2020 (Larger version of this image opens in a popup).
    Chemu Ng'ok, Untitled, 2020 (Larger version of this image opens in a popup).
    Chemu Ng'ok, Untitled, 2019 (Larger version of this image opens in a popup).
    Chemu Ng'ok, Untitled, 2019 (Larger version of this image opens in a popup).
    Chemu Ng'ok, Untitled, 2019 (Larger version of this image opens in a popup).
    Chemu Ng'ok, Untitled, 2019 (Larger version of this image opens in a popup).
    Chemu Ng'ok, Untitled, 2019 (Larger version of this image opens in a popup).
    Chemu Ng'ok, Untitled, 2018 (Larger version of this image opens in a popup).
    Chemu Ng'ok, Untitled, 2018 (Larger version of this image opens in a popup).
    Chemu Ng'ok, Untitled, 2020
  • Ng’ok has developed a confidently ebullient Expressionism of layered drawing—faces and figures teeming laterally and in depth—and of flowing brushwork, in deep-toned, plangent colors. 

    Peter Schjeldahl, The New Yorker, 2018

  • Video: Kiki Cheptoo Ng'ok

  • ‘The world of Chemu Ng’ok is a dark and wonderous place. This Kenyan painter’s practice is aesthetically brimming with reverie whilst simultaneously displaying a conceptual realism that is scarcely found in an artist so early in her career.’

    Astrid Gebhardt, The Lake, 2017

  • About Chemu Ng'ok Chemu Ng'ok (b.1989) lives and works in Nairobi, Kenya. She completed her Master's degree in Fine Art...

    About Chemu Ng'ok

    Chemu Ng'ok (b.1989) lives and works in Nairobi, Kenya. She completed her Master's degree in Fine Art (Painting) at Rhodes University, Grahamstown, in 2017 and was the recipient of the Mellon Foundation's Visual and Performing Arts of Africa Masters Bursary in 2016. She was selected to show five paintings at the Fourth New Museum Triennial, 'Songs for Sabotage', in New York (2018). Other recent group exhibitions include Blank Projects, Cape Town (2020, 2019); Pippy Houldsworth Gallery, London (2019); National Gallery of Zimbabwe, Harare (2017); Goodman Gallery, Cape Town (2015); and Rhodes University, Grahamstown (2014). This year she was shortlisted for the Henrike Grohs Art Award. Her first solo exhibition in the UK will open at Pippy Houldsworth Gallery, London, in March 2021.  

  • Press

    • Elephant Magazine

      Elephant Magazine

      8 April 2020

      The Essential Artists You Need To Know Right Now

    • Culture Type

      Culture Type

      21 July 2019

      Black Female Artists Are Headlining Exhibitions Throughout London This Summer. By Victoria L Valentine

       

    • Ocula Magazine

      Ocula Magazine

      20 April 2018

      Songs for Sabotage: the 4th New Museum Triennial. By David Xu Borgonjon

    • Artnet News

      Artnet News

      12 February 2018

      See Photos of the Highlights From the New Museum’s ‘Songs for Sabotage’ Triennial. By Sarah Cascone

    • Hyperallergic

      Hyperallergic

      13 February 2018

      New Museum Triennial Takes a Global View of Aesthetic Resistance. By Benjamin Sutton

    • Art Africa

      Art Africa

      September 2015

      Ivy Brandie Chemutai Ng'ok: A glorious fleshy mash up. By Anna Stielau

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