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Sam Nhlengethwa || Jazz and Blues at night

12 August - 25 September 2021
Goodman Gallery, London

Goodman Gallery is pleased to present Jazz and Blues at Night, a new series of prints, tapestries and mixed media collage works by Sam Nhlengethwa, paying homage to the musicians that have inspired him throughout his five decades-long artistic career. This marks Nhlengethwa’s first solo exhibition in London, following a smaller presentation of his work in London last year as well as a recent solo exhibition at the Rupert Museum in Stellenbosch, South Africa.

Over the course of his career, Nhlengethwa – dubbed by critics “one of the country’s most celebrated living artists” – has developed a distinctive collage and painting practice while exploring themes common to everyday life in South Africa, the street life, domestic interiors to the influence of mining. Intrinsic to this practice is Nhlengethwa’s love of jazz.

From the age of 15, Nhlengethwa was exposed to the genre through his two older brothers who listened to everything from the classic standards of artists such as Miles Davis and Dave Brubek to the more experimental sounds of Sun Ra, Eric Dolphy and Charles Mingus, to name a few.

Artworks

Hand-woven mohair tapestry
Work: 267 x 200 cm
Hand-woven mohair tapestry
Work: 267 x 200 cm
Mixed media on canvas
Work: 101.5 x 70.4 x 10.1 cm
Mixed media on canvas
Work: 90.5 x 100.5 x 10.1 cm
Unavailable
Mixed media on canvas
Work: 90.5 x 100.5 x 10.1 cm
Unavailable
Acrylic and vinyl text
Work: 94 x 314 cm
Mixed media on canvas
Work: 100.5 x 90.5 x 10 cm
Unavailable
Mixed media on canvas
Work: 100.5 x 90.5 x 10 cm
Mixed media on canvas
Work: 100.5 x 90.5 x 10 cm
Mixed media on canvas
Work: 100.5 x 90.5 x 10.1 cm
Unavailable
Mixed media on canvas
Work: 90.5 x 100.5 x 10 cm
Mixed media on canvas
Work: 90.5 x 100.5 x 10 cm
Mixed media on canvas
Work: 90.5 x 100.5 x 10 cm
Unavailable
Three colour lithograph
Image: 68.5 x 49.5 cm
Unavailable
Three colour lithograph
Image: 68.5 x 49.5 cm
Unavailable
Three colour lithograph
Paper: 76 x 57 cm
Three colour lithograph
Image: 68.5 x 49.5 cm
Unavailable
Three colour lithograph
Image: 68.5 x 49.5 cm
Unavailable
Five colour lithograph
Image: 57 x 76 cm
Unavailable
Mixed media on canvas
Work: 141 x 100 x 10 cm
Unavailable
Ten coloured lithographs
Work (each): 31 x 31 cm
Mixed media on canvas
Work: 38.5 x 38.5 x 6.8 cm
Mixed media on canvas
Frame: 38.5 x 38.5 x 6.8 cm
Mixed media on canvas
Frame: 38.5 x 38.5 x 6.8 cm
Mixed media on canvas
Frame: 38.5 x 38.5 x 6.8 cm
Unavailable
Mixed media on canvas
Frame: 38.5 x 38.5 x 6.8 cm
Mixed media on canvas
Frame: 38.5 x 38.5 x 6.8 cm
Mixed media on canvas
Frame: 38.5 x 38.5 x 6.8 cm
Mixed media on canvas
Frame: 38.5 x 38.5 x 6.8 cm
Mixed media on canvas
Frame: 38.5 x 38.5 x 6.8 cm
Mixed media on canvas
Frame: 38.5 x 38.5 x 6.8 cm
Mixed media on canvas
Frame: 38.5 x 38.5 x 6.8 cm
Mixed media on canvas
Frame: 38.5 x 38.5 x 6.8 cm
Mixed media on canvas
Frame: 38.5 x 38.5 x 6.8 cm
Mixed media on canvas
Frame: 38.5 x 38.5 x 6.8 cm
Mixed media on canvas
Frame: 38.5 x 38.5 x 6.8 cm
Mixed media on canvas
Frame: 38.5 x 38.5 x 6.8 cm
Mixed media on canvas
Work: 70 x 100.1 x 9.8 cm
Mixed media on canvas
Work: 90.2 x 100 x 9.8 cm
Unavailable
Mixed media on canvas
Work: 119.9 x 150 x 9.8 cm
Unavailable
Mixed media on canvas
Work: 109.8 x 120 x 9.8 cm
Unavailable
Mixed media on canvas
Work: 90.2 x 100.4 x 9.8 cm
Unavailable
Mixed media canvas
Work: 139.6 x 199.7 x 9.7 cm
Unavailable

About

Sam Nhlengethwa image

Sam Nhlengethwa

Sam Nhlengethwa was born in the black township community of Payneville near Springs (a satellite mining town east of Johannesburg), in 1955 and grew up in Ratanda location in nearby Heidelberg. In the 1980s, he moved to Johannesburg where he honed his practice at the renowned Johannesburg Art Foundation under its founder Bill Ainslie.

Nhlengethwa is one of the founders of the legendary Bag Factory in Newtown, in the heart of the city, where he used to share studio space with fellow greats of this pioneering generation of South African artists, such as David Koloane and Pat Mautloa.

Despite Nhlengethwa’s pioneering role in South Africa art, his work has received rare visibility in London. A major survey exhibition, titled Life, Jazz and Lots of Other Things, was hosted by SCAD Museum of Art in Savannah, Georgia in 2014, which was then co-hosted in Atlanta by SCAD and the Carter Center.

Other notable exhibitions and accolades in South Africa and around the world include: in 1994 – the year South Africa held its first democratic elections – Nhlengethwa was awarded the prestigious Standard Bank Young Artist of the Year award; in 1995, his work was included in the Whitechapel Gallery’s Seven Stories About Modern Art in Africa in London; in 2000, he participated in a two-man show at Seippel Art Gallery in Cologne.

Other significant international group exhibitions include Constructions: Contemporary Art from South Africa at Museu de Arte Contemporanea de Niteroi at in Brazil in 2011, Beyond Borders: Global Africa at the University of Michigan Museum of Art in 2018.

Nhlengethwa’s work has featured on a number of international biennales: in 2003, his work was included in the 8th Havana Biennale, Southern African Stories: A Print Collection, the 12th International Cairo Biennale in 2010, the 2013 Venice Biennale as part of the South African pavilion, titled Imaginary Fact: Contemporary South African Art and the Archive, and in the 6th Beijing Biennale in 2015.

Nhlengethwa’s practice features in important arts publications, such as Phaidon’s The 20th Century Art Book (2001).

Download full CV