Simnikiwe Buhlungu
Simnikiwe Buhlungu (b. 1995, South Africa, lives and works in Amsterdam, Netherlands) is interested in knowledge production(s) – how they are produced, by whom and what avenues of distribution can look like. By navigating these questions and their inexhaustible potential answers, Buhlungu locates and approaches socio-historical and everyday phenomena via research-based methodologies. Through this, she maps points out of cognisance and the endless layers of knowledge production.
Buhlungu completed a two year residency program at the Rijksakademie van Beeldende Kunsten in 2022. This year she has held a solo exhibition at Kunstinstituut Melly, Rotterdam, and her work has been shown at context and institutions including: Chisenhale Gallery, London; Kunst im Tunnel, Düsseldorf, Ellen de Bruijne PROJECTS, Amsterdam; Kunsthalle Bern; Association for Visual Arts Gallery, Cape Town; the 59th Venice Biennale; South London Gallery and Van Abbemuseum, Eindhoven.
Khuaya Stands
2022
4 watercoloured plywood podiums 90 × 90 × 80cm 90 × 60 × 80cm
Amid B and C and a knot and E (A conver-something)
2025
Posters for the upcoming conver-somethings in October 2025
Drawings by Daniel Aguilar Ruvalcaba and layout by Simnikiwe Buhlungu.
During the biennial Simnikiwe Buhlungu facilitates a series of exercises in Gamlestaden, the future site of Göteborgs Konsthall, as well as in spaces of informal gathering, such as the circle of chess players at Gothenburg’s City Library. These meetings, which the artist names conver-somethings, are spaces for knowledge to be made, questioned, and shared. A conversomething [noun and verb; context-dependent] often emerges through the auditory presence of its participants – listening, speaking, sounding – forming meaning collectively through sonic inquiry. These time-based events are signalled by the modular Khuaya stands, which are conceived as invitations – to sing, to sit, to read, to listen. They are intended to be rearranged, borrowed, and activated as a call toward communal activity. The four workshops with artist Simnikiwe Buhlungu will take place on October 15-17 at Gothenburg City Library and in Gamlestaden.
Produced in collaboration with Göteborgs Konsthall
