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Pamela Phatsimo Sunstrum

I have withheld much more than I have written

September 8 – October 22, 2022

Pamela Phatsimo Sunstrum, Mumbo Jumbo and the Committee (2022). Installation with wood, film, and painting components Running time: 56 seconds Painting, overall: 48 1/8 x 96 in (122 x 244 cm)

Pamela Phatsimo Sunstrum, Mumbo Jumbo and the Committee (2022). Installation with wood, film, and painting components Running time: 56 seconds Painting, overall: 48 1/8 x 96 in (122 x 244 cm)

Pamela Phatsimo Sunstrum The Butchers, 2022 Pencil and oil on wood panels 30 x 60 x 1 5/8 in (76.2 x 152.4 x 4.1 cm) (GL15365)

Pamela Phatsimo Sunstrum

The Butchers, 2022

Pencil and oil on wood panels

30 x 60 x 1 5/8 in (76.2 x 152.4 x 4.1 cm)

(GL15365)

Pamela Phatsimo Sunstrum Lambsheart, 2022 Signed, titled, and dated on reverse Oil and pencil on linen 73 3/4 x 55 1/2 inches (200 x 140.9 cm) (GL15591)

Pamela Phatsimo Sunstrum

Lambsheart, 2022

Signed, titled, and dated on reverse

Oil and pencil on linen

73 3/4 x 55 1/2 inches (200 x 140.9 cm)

(GL15591)

Pamela Phatsimo Sunstrum Walkie Talkie, 2022 Signed, titled, and dated on reverse Oil and pencil on wood panels 50 x 40 1/8 in (127 x 102 cm) (GL15595)

Pamela Phatsimo Sunstrum

Walkie Talkie, 2022

Signed, titled, and dated on reverse

Oil and pencil on wood panels

50 x 40 1/8 in (127 x 102 cm)

(GL15595)

Pamela Phatsimo Sunstrum Frangipani, 2022 Signed, titled, and dated on reverse Oil and pencil on linen 74 7/8 x 58 3/4 in (189.9 x 149.2 cm) (GL15593)

Pamela Phatsimo Sunstrum

Frangipani, 2022

Signed, titled, and dated on reverse

Oil and pencil on linen

74 7/8 x 58 3/4 in (189.9 x 149.2 cm)

(GL15593)

Pamela Phatsimo Sunstrum The Chair, 2022 Signed, titled, and dated on reverse Oil and pencil on wood panel 29 7/8 x 24 1/8 in (76 x 61 cm) (GL15589)

Pamela Phatsimo Sunstrum

The Chair, 2022

Signed, titled, and dated on reverse

Oil and pencil on wood panel

29 7/8 x 24 1/8 in (76 x 61 cm)

(GL15589)

amela Phatsimo Sunstrum Balebetse (the sky the stars), 2022 Oil and pencil on canvas 61 5/8 x 63 1/2 in (156.4 x 161.2 cm) Framed: 64 3/8 x 66 x 1 3/4 in (163.5 x 167.6 x 4.4 cm) (GL15588)

Pamela Phatsimo Sunstrum

Balebetse (the sky the stars), 2022

Oil and pencil on canvas

61 5/8 x 63 1/2 in (156.4 x 161.2 cm)
Framed: 64 3/8 x 66 x 1 3/4 in (163.5 x 167.6 x 4.4 cm)

(GL15588)

Pamela Phatsimo Sunstrum Front Room, 2022 Signed, titled, and dated on reverse Oil and pencil on linen 73 1/2 x 77 1/4 in (186.6 x 196.2 cm) (GL15594)

Pamela Phatsimo Sunstrum

Front Room, 2022

Signed, titled, and dated on reverse

Oil and pencil on linen

73 1/2 x 77 1/4 in (186.6 x 196.2 cm)

(GL15594)

Pamela Phatsimo Sunstrum Sinner Get Ready, 2022 Signed and dated on reverse of each panel Oil and pencil on wood panels 40 1/8 x 63 3/4 in (102 x 162 cm) (GL15587)

Pamela Phatsimo Sunstrum

Sinner Get Ready, 2022

Signed and dated on reverse of each panel

Oil and pencil on wood panels

40 1/8 x 63 3/4 in (102 x 162 cm)

(GL15587)

Pamela Phatsimo Sunstrum Garden Girl, 2022 Signed, titled, and dated on reverse of each panel Oil and pencil on wood panels 40 x 60 in (101.6 x 152 cm) (GL15592)

Pamela Phatsimo Sunstrum

Garden Girl, 2022

Signed, titled, and dated on reverse of each panel

Oil and pencil on wood panels

40 x 60 in (101.6 x 152 cm)

(GL15592)

Press Release

Opening Thursday, September 8, 2022, 6:00pm – 8:00pm

Artist in conversation with Tao Leigh Goffe: Saturday, September 10, 2:00pm – 3:00pm. Watch recording.

View a 360 virtual tour of the exhibition

Galerie Lelong & Co., New York is pleased to announce a solo exhibition by Pamela Phatsimo Sunstrum, the artist’s first major solo exhibition in New York. I have withheld much more than I have written will feature new works: a large installation and a suite of paintings. The figures in Sunstrum’s works—often her alter-egos—are situated in undefinable landscapes; an exploration of cultural embeddedness within geology that reflects overlapping issues of colonialism, capitalism, and so-called global migration crises. With references to domestic environments, rurality, and systems of control, Sunstrum’s work journeys into processes of disintegration—processes that are at once intimate, violent, sensual, madding, and tender—in the pursuit of home and wholeness.

The central thesis of the exhibition recalls the first vehicle for spectacle—Daguerre’s diorama of 1822—with a new installation Mumbo Jumbo and the Committee (2022) from which a narrative saga unfolds. Upon entering the smaller gallery, visitors are met with a diptych depicting seated men and women in Victorian dress, their appraising gazes looking into the distance past a red projector and an empty red chair. Wooden pews invite visitors to sit and face the same direction as the figures, toward a free-standing installation on the other side of the room. A wooden structure that parallels the architecture of Victorian theatre through the proscenium arch frames a video work containing a living room setting; replete with the chairs and settees of Sunstrum’s paintings and the volcanic landscape from Daguerre’s diorama. Figures appear in the space, their gaze meeting those of the committee.

This atmosphere of surveilling tension seeps into the rest of the exhibition where new paintings are on view, rendered in oil and pencil on linen. As with much of Sunstrum’s oeuvre, the works emerge from a constellation of literary references including Dionne Brand’s The Blue Clerk (2018) (a quote from which gives the title of the show), and most notably, the writings of Bessie Head (b.1937-d.1986). In particular, Sunstrum references Head’s A Question of Power (1973), a semi-autobiographical work set “amidst the compartmentalization, fragmentation, and preoccupation with taxonomy that characterize and undermine life in Southern Africa.” Exuding a fluidity in her visual poems, Sunstrum layers references and metaphors within each work; a plastic chair ubiquitous in the Global South misses a leg, black and white checkerboard flooring do not offer a sense of place.

The figures of Sunstrum’s work stand as a collective; they are often representations of herself through the alter-ego Asme (“as me”) or based on historic photographs of Black ancestors. “Identity, power, selfhood and the political power that comes along with those ideas can never be reduced to a single standing being. My single body is a representative of masses of bodies, whether as community or as ancestry or as collective history or collective memory, of solidarity,” the artist has said.

This exhibition is organized in collaboration with Goodman Gallery, Cape Town, Johannesburg, and London.

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