Professor Samson Kambalu

Background

Professor Samson Kambalu studied at the University of Malawi (BA Fine Art and Ethnomusicology); Nottingham Trent University (MA Fine Art) and Chelsea College of Art and Design (PhD Fine Art). He is an artist and writer working in a variety of media, including site-specific installation, video, performance and literature. His work is autobiographical and approaches art as an arena for critical thought and sovereign activities. Born in Malawi Kambalu’s work fuses aspects of the Nyau culture of the Chewa, the anti-reification theories of the Situationist movement and the Protestant tradition of inquiry, criticism and dissent.
Kambalu’s first book, an autobiographical novel of his childhood upbringing in Africa, The Jive Talker, was published by Jonathan Cape in 2008 and toured around Europe for four years. He has been included in major exhibitions and projects worldwide, including the Dakar Biennale (2014, 2016), Tokyo International Art Festival (2009) and the Liverpool Biennial (2004, 2016). Kambalu, who began his academic career at the University of Malawi, has won research fellowships with Yale University and the Smithsonian Institution, and was included in All the World’s Futures, Venice Biennale 2015, curated by Okwui Enwezor

Teaching

Professor of fine art at the Ruskin School of Art, fine art fellow at Magdalen College.

Research

Professor Kambalu’s current practice-led research is in contemporary art and the problematic of the gift; and ‘cinema of attractions’ and its relationship to fine art praxis.

Film

2019, The Boy Who Harnessed the Wind, BBC, Netflix (Actor, Translator, and consultant)

Selected Exhibitions

Solo

• 2020, Postcards from the Last Century, Peer, London
• 2019, Nyasaland Analysand, Goodman Gallery, Johannesburg, South Africa
• 2018, Graphomania, The James Gallery, The Graduate Centre, CUNY, New York
• 2017, Wounded Negatives, Zietz Mocca, Cape Town, South Africa
• 2017, Ghost Dance, Goodman Gallery, Cape Town South Africa
• 2017, Nyau Western: American Psychogeographicals, Art Basel Statements, Switzerland
• 2017, Red Barn Farm, Galerie Nordenhake, Stockholm, Sweden
• 2016, Nyau Cinema (Black Maria), NSU Art Museum, Fort Lauderdale, Miami USA
• 2016, Introduction to Nyau Cinema, Whitechapel Gallery, London
• 2016, Capsules, Mountains and Forts, Kate MacGarry, London
• 2015, The Unbearable Lightness of Nyau Cinema, Gallery U Mloka, Olomouc, Czech Republic
• 2014, Sepia Rain, Stevenson Johannesburg, South Africa
• 2012, Tattoo City: The First Three Chapters (with guests), Castlefield Gallery, Manchester 2009. Roseanne, Sai Gallery, Osaka, Japan
• 2008, The Jive Talker, book launch and installation, INIVA, London
• 2005, Black My Story, Nottingham Castle and Art Gallery, Nottingham
• 2004, Holyball Exercises and Exorcisms, Usher Gallery, Lincoln
• 2004, Holyballism, Art Exchange Gallery, Nottingham
• 2001, The Gideons’ Room, Winston Hotel, Amsterdam, The Netherlands
• 2000, Exercise IV, Thami Mnyele Foundation, Amsterdam, The Netherlands
• 2000, Holyball Exercises and Exorcisms, Chancellor College, Zomba, Malawi

Group

• 2020, Fotofest Biennial – African Cosmologies, Houston, Texas
• 2020, History Without A Past – with Vincent Meessen of Venice 2015 Belgian Pavilion, Muzee, Ostend, Belgium
• 2020, Happy, NSU Art Museum, Fort Lauderdale, Florida
• 2019, Dallas Media Fest, Dallas, Texas
• 2017, The Public Body, Artspace, Sydney, Australia
• 2017, Africas Capital as part of L’Afrique s’expose à La Villette ! (Africa is exposed in La Villette!), La Villette, Paris, France
• 2017, Cinema Mon Armour, Aargauer Kunsthaus, Aarau, Switzerland
• 2017, Summer Show, Goodman Gallery, Cape Town, South Africa
• 2016, Qalandiya International Biennale, Haifa, Gaza, London, Beirut, Amman, Jerusalem, Ramallah & Bethlehem
• 2016, Retrogarde, The Rogan Centre, University of Chicago, USA
• 2016, Detail is All, Kunsthalle Mainz, Germany
• 2016, Dakar Biennale, Senegal
• 2016, Liverpool Biennial, UK
• 2016, Art Festival Watou, Belgium
• 2016, Lost & Found, Paradiso, Amsterdam, The Netherlands
• 2015, Embodied Nikolaj Kunsthal, Copenhagen, Denmark
• 2015, 50/50 New Church Museum, Cape Town
• 2015, Drawing Biennial, London
• 2015, Transformation Marathon, Serpentine Gallery. London
• 2015, Schema, Stevenson Cape Town, South Africa
• 2015, Venice Biennale, All the World’s Futures
• 2014, Chroma, Stevenson Cape Town, South Africa
• 2014, Dakar Biennial, Senegal
• 2014, Nyau!, Espace D’art Contemporain, Porrentury, Switzerland
• 2014, The Book Lovers, Artist novels project, Cricoteka, Krakow
• 2014, The Book Lovers, De Appel, Amsterdam
• 2013, The Book Lovers, Museum of Modern Art, Warsaw
• 2012, Luke Fowler: Pilgrimage from Scattered Points, HMVCurzon Wimbledon, guest artist showing Early Film, London
• 2009, Tokyo International Art Festival, Tokyo, Japan
• 2009-2010, Dialogue Among Nations, Art for Humanity, South Africa. (Part of FIFA World Cup 2010)
• 2008, Art Osaka, Osaka, Japan
• 2008, The Mausoleum of Lost Objects, INIVA, London
• 2008, Next We Change Earth, The New Art Exchange Gallery, Nottingham
• 2006, Hinterland, Nottingham
• 2006, Ballkünstler (Part of FIFA World Cup 2006) Museum der Bildenden Kunste, Leipzig, Germany. Artists included Kendall Geers, Greg Colson and Wim Delvoye.
• 2006, The Beautiful Game, Brooklyn Institute of Contemporary Arts, USA
• 2004, Bloomberg New Contemporaries 2004, The Barbican, London, UK.
• 2004, Bloomberg New Contemporaries 2004, Liverpool Biennial, UK
• 2004, One Step Beyond, Derby Museum and Art Gallery, UK
• 2003, Guess Who, Stedelijk Museum, Zwolle, The Netherlands
• 2003, Black My Story, Museum De Paviljoens, Almere, The Netherlands. (Artists included Jimmie Durham, Remy Jungeman, Shirana Shahbazi and Chikako Watanabe.)