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SAATCHI YATES

NOKU / NAUMAN

Saatchi Yates Presents a Duo Exhibition by Nokukhanya Langa

Saatchi Yates presents a two person exhibition featuring works by radical contemporary artist Nokukhanya Langa alongside leading American conceptual master Bruce Nauman. The show draws on the connection between both artists’ use of alternative methodologies creating a common language that uses absurdist text, puns, finding meaning in the banal. A new body of work by Langa centred around ‘Black Paintings’ is presented alongside Nauman’s black and white films.

Nokukhanya Langa’s Post-Minimalist aesthetic is echoed in the repetitive, tasklike exercises of Nauman’s conceptual works. Unlearning the rigidity of her training in traditional oil painting, she plays with abstract motifs; lines, dots, scribbles and various other mark making techniques are paired with phrases, arrows and signs which lead the viewer nowhere. Langa’s sculptural canvases comment on contemporary post-internet culture, highlighting themes of futility, alienation, and online identity.

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Whilst living in California, Nauman began working in film as early as 1965. Nauman’s films often feature simple, repetitive actions that highlight the tension between the artist’s physical endurance and the mundane nature of the tasks. From creating conceptual work and post-minimalist work, with emphasis on meaning over aesthetics, Nauman often uses irony and wordplay with persistent themes and ideas that provoke the viewer’s participation, to raise issues about estrangement and reality.

Language in Nauman’s art serves as a conduit for communication, but also as a medium for questioning the nature of language itself, its ability to convey truth, and its limitations. Similarly, Langa employs dark humour in her text to challenge power structures that lie within us, seen in examples, ‘dreams go Thru 2 gates’ and ‘you wait for something you hold your breath’. The absurdity of her text coupled with the spiral symbol creates a dialogue with the ideas explored by Nauman and demonstrates how Nauman’s creative output has had a profound impact on a younger generation of artists.

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NOKUKHANYA LANGA

(b. 1991, Maryland, USA)

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Born in Silver Spring, Maryland, USA, and now based in Ghent, Belgium, Langa has grown up living between the United States, India, South Africa, The Netherlands, and Belgium. Her art practice reconciles the pluralities of her personal story, mixed cultural heritage, and lived experiences; all coming together to form part of her large-scale paintings, filled with vibrant imagery in a stream-of-consciousness style.

Unlearning the rigidity of her training in traditional oil painting, she plays with abstract motifs; colour, swirls, and other fluid shapes, working in unison with more recognisable motifs like text and signs. Shifting back and forth between figuration and abstraction, the result is an agile use of approachable jargon and aesthetics that convey the more subtle, and incendiary subtext of the works in a kind of hallucinatory reality. Langa’s work has been exhibited at major institutions including, Centre Pompidou, Paris, France (2020-2021); Kunstinstituut Melly, Rotterdam, Netherlands (2022) and chi K11 Art Museum in Shanghai, China (2023).

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BRUCE NAUMAN

(b. 1941, Fort Wayne, Indiana, USA)

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Bruce Nauman was born in 1941 in Fort Wayne, Indiana. He studied art, mathematics, and physics at the University of Wisconsin at Madison from 1960 to 1964 continuing studying at the University of California at Davis, to graduate with an MFA in 1966. Since the mid-1960s, the artist has created an open-ended body of work that includes sculptures, films, holograms, interactive environments, neon wall reliefs, photographs, prints, sculptures, videotapes, and performance.

A Nauman retrospective was organized by the Walker Art Center, Minneapolis. In 1997, the Kunstmuseum Wolfburg mounted another major retrospective, which toured the Centre Georges Pompidou in Paris, Hayworld Gallery in London and Nykytaiteen Museo in Helsinki. Since then, Nauman has had major solo exhibitions at DIA Center for the Arts (2002), Tate Modern (2004), Scottsdale Museum of Contemporary Art (2005), Tate Liverpool (2006), Milwaukee Art Museum (2006), and Berkeley Art Museum. Nauman represented the U.S. in the 2009 Venice Biennale.

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Nokukhanya Langa

Withgoodintentions, 2024

on canvas

120 x 110 cm

Lacquer

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Nokukhanya Langa

At least the sun still shines, 2024 Oil and mixed media on canvas

180 x 170 cm

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Meanings are hidden behind the text surface “Wearejustabunchofwordsthathavebeenstrungtogether”

Dreams vs reason, which gates do intentions go through? “Hellisfullofgoodmeanings,butHeavenisfullofgoodworks”

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Oil and mixed media on canvas

65 x 55 cm

Nokukhanya Langa

Coda Four, 2024

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Oil and mixed media on canvas

65 x 55 cm

Nokukhanya Langa

Coda Two, 2024

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Wishyouwere, 2024

Oil and mixed media on canvas

120 x 110 cm

Nokukhanya Langa

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Bruce Nauman

PullingMouth, 1969

16mm film transferred to video, black & white, silent 8 min

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120

110 cm

Nokukhanya Langa Likealight, 2024

Lacquer on canvas

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Acenturyofmypricelesstime, 2024

Oil and mixed media on canvas

120 x 110 cm

Nokukhanya Langa

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2024

Oil and mixed media on canvas

120 x 110 cm

Nokukhanya Langa Immortaliseyourself,

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Nokukhanya Langa

I’ve been around for millennia, 2024

Oil and mixed media on canvas

200 x 190 cm

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Millennia, Eternity, Circular motion

Eternityasthesymbolofrepetitionandpsychologicalthoughtloops

“I am young and brand new and I’m still learning how to live”

Lifeassplashesofcolour,self-explorationwithoutjudgment

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Nokukhanya Langa Gasp,gasp,gasp, 2024

Lacquer on canvas

120 x 110 cm

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Bruce Nauman

PacingUpsideDown, 1969

Video installation, black & white, sound 55 min

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Darling, 2024

Oil and mixed media on canvas

65 x 55 cm

Nokukhanya Langa

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Somepsychicpain, 2024

Oil and mixed media on canvas

120 x 110 cm

Nokukhanya Langa

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Throwback to the early 2000s, slogans on t-shirts

Distortionofcalligraphyandvulnerablecommerciallanguage

Child-like naivete in pastel drawing and direction-less arrows Whathappenswithasenseofplayunderthepressureofsocialnorms?

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Bruce Nauman

SlowAngleWalk(BeckettWalk), 1968

Single-channel digital video, transferred from video tape, black & white, sound

60 min

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If it is not about you and me, who is it about?

Theartworkanswersthequestionwithatitle:“ASecretThirdThing”

Black hole - so strong that nothing can escape Blackholeasstencilgraphiclayeroranobjectofadmiration?

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You’re, 2024

Oil and mixed media on canvas

65 x 55 cm

Nokukhanya Langa

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Closer to God, 2023

Oil and mixed media on canvas

120 x 110 cm

Nokukhanya Langa

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Bruce Nauman

Violent Incident--Man Woman, 1986

Videotape, colour, sound 30 min

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Oil and mixed media on canvas

200 x 190 cm

Nokukhanya Langa NREM, 2024

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Title: NREM (Non-rapid eye movement)

Slow-lookingallowsonetogobeyondabstractionandseeaflower

Formed light canvases are achieved using styrofoam

Theuniquenessofthetechniqueisinthedeceptionofvision

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Bruce Nauman

ManipulatingaFluorescentTube, 1969

Single-channel video, black & white, sound 62 min

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120 x 110 cm

Nokukhanya Langa

Like a knife, 2024

Lacquer on canvas

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Little, 2024

Oil and mixed media on canvas

65 x 55 cm

Nokukhanya Langa

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Oil and mixed media on canvas

65 x 55 cm

Nokukhanya Langa

My, 2024

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Nokukhanya Langa

Nerve center , 2024

Oil and mixed media on canvas

120 x 110 cm

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Perpetualpresent, 2024

Oil and mixed media on canvas

180 x 170 cm

Nokukhanya Langa

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Horn - Ivory, Painful - Hilarious

Painfulorhilariouswhendeceitfuldreamscomethroughanivorygate

Labeled black dots as neurotransmitters in the brain

Whatmessagesandactionsdofeaturedtermscreateinajointshape?...

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503, 2024

Oil and mixed media on canvas

200 x 190 cm

Nokukhanya Langa

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Lion and sun - symbols of power and national pride Whathappenswithculturalidentitywhilemovingcountries?

Visual representation of all the houses Noku lived in The work is set in India – before she moved to the Netherlands

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Tattoo inspiration - external symbols bringing an intrinsic value Internalthoughts,dreams,nightmares“pushingout”colour

Dots in a circle – the clock of time lost in space

Asrecreationofmemoriesinaninfinitespace-timematrix