ART CITIES:London-Senga Nengudi

The work of Senga Nengudi has been at the forefront of sculptural, performative, and photographic practices for over forty years. After studying art and dance in California and Japan, and receiving her master’s degree in sculpture, Nengudi became a key participant in the young African American Avant-Garde in both Los Angeles and New York in the 1970s and 1980s.

By Efi Michalarou
Photo: Sprüth Magers Gallery Archive

Senga Nengudi developed early on her renowned sculptural series, “R.S.V.P.” (1975- ), which incorporates nylon stockings as well as every-day and industrial materials into supple, entwining sculptures that recall attenuated bodies, viscera and other organic matter. Though these have come to represent her work, at the same time they offer only one window into her diverse, multidisciplinary approach that likewise encompasses large-scale installations, performance photographs and videos, and objects combining plastics, liquid, pigments, and sand. The centerpiece of the exhibition at Sprüth Magers Gallery  in London,  is her monumental installation “Bulemia” (1990- ), recently recreated at the Henry Moore Institute for the first time since its original presentation in 1990. Inside a specially constructed room, the walls are covered in an abundant collage of recent newspapers. The articles Nengudi has incorporated relate to civil rights issues affecting the African American community, but rather than excising them from the page, the artist includes the entire sheet so that all of the newspaper’s additional context remains intact, including advertisements, weather reports, and other articles. In “Performance Piece” (1978), for example, a dancer engages with one of the artist’s nylon “R.S.V.P.” sculptures, arching and contorting her body in relation to the works’ knotted, pliable strands. “Flying” (1982-2014), a suite of eight photographs printed and presented here for the very first time, captures members of the artist collective Studio Z (including Nengudi and the artist-performer Maren Hassinger) as they make sound and perform improvisationally before a white stone edifice. Over the years, Nengudi has experimented with unconventional substances to produce arrangements of paintings and sculptures influenced by various concepts of ritual. In “Sandmining” (2018), a field of sand covers the floor, some areas of which are molded into pyramid-like, ceremonial mounds, inspired by Native American healing rituals, but also reminiscent of Zen gardens and even gestural painting. These works and a selection of recent sculptures, which return to themes and materials found in her earliest sculptures, make clear the importance of Nengudi’s work to the development and legacy of postminimalism. As in the work of artists such as Eva Hesse, Bruce Nauman, and Judy Chicago (the latter two who, like Nengudi, were also practicing art in Southern California beginning in the late 1960s), her Water Compositions (1969–70/2018) play with color, malleability, and embodiment. Inside transparent, heat-sealed vinyl casings, candy-hued water gives shape and visual punch to drooping plastic forms. In Nengudi’s newest series,” A.C.Q.” (Air Conditioning Queen), the artist reprises her work with stockings in sculptures that explore further the inherent strength and ephemerality of the nylon medium. “A.C.Q. III” (2016–17) echoes the shape of a body, splayed out in a manner that could be read as majestically flying, or possibly violently suspended. In “A.C.Q. I” (2016–17), the artist has combined tied, knotted and sand-filled stretches of pantyhose with refrigerator and air conditioner parts, creating a kind of stage set within which the hose flutter gently, guided by the machines’ fans. Always pushing her work forward, while folding in important, longstanding inquiries, Nengudi continues to create highly original and evocative works that feel as groundbreaking today as they did in decades past.

Info: Sprüth Magers Gallery, 7A Grafton Street, London, Duration: 7/6-13/7/19, Days & Hours: Tue-Sat 10:00-18:00, http://spruethmagers.com