For some, Noku/Nauman is a demonstration of clarity as much as an exploration of spontaneity; to others, it’s both kaleidoscopic and ridiculous, fantastical and satirical. Either way, this show is, quite deliberately, entirely unhinged, whether it succeeds in being a release from our reality and an embracing of our insanity or not.
It’s after inhaling these fumes that its creators, Nokukhanya Langa and Bruce Nauman, tumble through a rabbit hole of unconstrained lunacy. As observers are beckoned down alongside them, we are given the opportunity to acknowledge Nokukhanya Langa’s contemporary ‘Black Paintings’. These works have been disjointedly strewn with impressionistic tropes, from perplexing catchwords to nonsensical arrow projectiles that, consequently, suggest an irrepressibly rampaging frenzy within her practice. To put it forthrightly, it’s almost as if the artist couldn’t finalise one consideration before frenziedly moving on to another.
As a consequence of their ambiguity, Langa’s paintings are left entirely interpretable by their observers. This is only reinforced through an subdued colour palette that almost renders the phrases they contain invisible, particularly those reading “you’re in my heart, oh darling” in ‘Like a light’ (2024) and “my dream is to be with you” in ‘Gasp, gasp, gasp’( 2024). On the other side of the spectrum, those including ‘Perpetual present’ (2024), ‘NREM’ (2024) and ‘I’ve been around for millennia’(2024) summon comparisons to Nauman’s neon light-based sculptures, both when it concerns their mind-bending patterns and bombastic energy. When put together, they are as chaotic and fast-paced as the behaviours that determine post-internet culture: futility, alienation and online identification, as well as the rules that regurgitate them.
That Noku/Nauman displays an electrifying combination of suspended, inanimate creations alongside continuously moving videography-orientated projects realised by Bruce Nauman, isn’t easily overlooked either. As a matter of fact, it is only further underpinned by a blankness to this show’s surroundings that is acted out through sparse white panels as well as glaring overhead lights, that for practical reasons, catapults the creative projects into a greater focus. Coming from a more philosophical perspective, this space appears to resemble a blank computer screen that flickers on and off when observers make their way across it, as if powered by the energy they exert to understand its overall artistic codes and the programmes they enact.
In this sense, reflection and progression aren’t lost on either artist. As a matter of fact, these dualities are consistent within their various creative endeavours, and their interpretations of them here are complementary. For instance, Nauman’s film projects that have been displayed on screens here, and particularly those from when he first began working on them in 1965, use wit and wordplay to instigate their watcher’s participation, whilst also addressing questions around disassociation and reality. This is reiterated through the individual production’s concentration on mundane, mechanical actions that accentuate the struggle between their artist’s physical stoicism and the wearisome nature of tasks.
Ultimately, discourse and language serve as conduits for communication within the construct of Nauman’s practice. Nevertheless, they are also used as a bedrock to ponder the nature of speech itself, as well as its prowess in imparting sincerity. Adopting her cue from this, Langa’s approach seemingly depends upon a morbid humour to demonstrate her confrontations with the deep-seated, social hierarchies we are conditioned to climb.
Noku/Nauman
Saatchi Yates, 14 Bury St, London SW1Y 6AL
Running to August 16th, 2024
London based, future facing, arts and culture writer
