Thenjiwe Niki Nkosi - NOMEN: American Women Artists from 1945 to Today New York Monday, June 17, 2019 | Phillips

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  • Provenance

    Acquired directly from the artist by the present owner

  • Catalogue Essay


    Thenjiwe Niki Nkosi

    Born 1980, New York

    2006 BA Harvard University
    2008 MFA School of Visual Arts, New York


    Selected museum exhibitions: Goethe-Institut, Johannesburg (2018); Fondation Louis Vuitton, Paris (2017); Seed Space, Nashville (2017); National Gallery of Zimbabwe (2016); Somerset House, London (2015); Joberg Pavilion, Venice (2015); Standard Bank Gallery, Johannesburg (2013); Fundação Calouste Gulbenkian, Lisbon (2011)
    Selected honors: Pro-Helvetia Grant (2015); Residency, FRAC des Pays de la Loire, France (2013); Ithuba Art Fund Grant (2011); National Arts Council of South Africa Grant (2009, 2015)
    Selected public collections: The Dean Collection, New York; Nando Collection, Cape Town


    Born in New York, Thenjiwe Niki Nkosi lives and works in Johannesburg. Her paintings, films, and videos investigate power and its structures – political, social, and architectural. Her painting Emergent Phenomena II, from 2017, is a prime example of her Architectures series. In its background is the massive headquarters of Johannesburg’s Standard Bank, Africa’s biggest lender by assets. Nkosi interrupts the building’s massive rectilinear shapes with brightly hued tropical flowers in the foreground, their organic forms implicitly suggesting an alternative to the bank’s institutional power.

66

Emergent Phenomena II (After Standard Bank Head Office)

signed and dated "Thenjiwe Niki Nkosi 2017" on the overlap
oil on canvas
59 1/8 x 78 3/4 in. (150.2 x 200 cm.)
Executed in 2017.

Estimate On Request

NOMEN: American Women Artists from 1945 to Today

New York Selling Exhibition 19 June - 3 August 2019