Andrew Kreps Gallery is pleased to announce Silent Strength, an exhibition of works by Everlyn Nicodemus (b. 1954, Kilimanjaro, Tanzania).
Since the 1980s, Everlyn Nicodemus has developed a singular body of work spanning multiple media, investigating the relationship between art and trauma. Her series Silent Strength, executed between 1989 - 1990, depicts the triumph of humanity over systems of oppression and authority. Rendered in flowing, curved lines, and undulating tones of reds and orange, each becomes a celebratory depicition of the beauty of the female form, with Nicodemus stating “where better to reclaim freedoms than with my own body? Free and unrestricted. Using my body and curves as a point of departure offered a new beginning.” Often drawing on her own experiences with racism in her work, she notes, “There is a silent strength among us that is required in order to brave the struggles contemporary women are confronted with, especially women from minority communities who have been written out of history in so many ways.”
Silent Strength is the first presentation of Everlyn Nicodemus’ work in New York. In 2024, the National Gallery of Scotland will mount an expansive retrospective of Nicodemus’ work, for which she was the recipient of the 2022 Freelands Prize. One of the strongest feminist voices to emerge from Eastern Africa in the last three decades, Everlyn Nicodemus is an artist, writer, and curator. Between 1994 and 2000, Nicodemus served on the advisory board of Third Text, the leading international journal dedicated to the critical analysis of contemporary art in the global field. In 2012, Nicodemus was awarded her PhD from Middlesex University following the submission of her thesis “African Modern Art and Black Cultural Trauma.” She subsequently co-edited the influential book Modern Art in Africa, Asia and Latin America: An Introduction to Global Modernism, which was published in 2012.