By Noma Faingold

You can’t separate the art from the artist. With Nigerian painter and humanitarian Nengi Omuku, that is a really good thing, as opposed to infamous misogynist Pablo Picasso, pedophile and bigamist Paul Gauguin and murderous pimp Caravaggio (born Michelangelo Merisi).

The Impressionist paintings of up-and-coming Omuku, 39, embrace heritage, revere nature, while grappling with the human condition, in all its struggles and triumphs.

Her first U.S. solo museum exhibition, “Nengi Omuku: The Gathering,” will be presented by the Fine Arts Museums of San Francisco (FAMSF) from June 27 until May 14, 2028 in the rts of Africa galleries of the de Young Museum. Four new paintings created for the exhibit will be displayed alongside four other recent oil paintings. Omuku’s work will mingle with sculptures and textile works from the institution’s historical collection.

Working on handwoven cotton sanyan cloth, a historic Yoruba textile once made of silk and cotton, her evocative landscapes are not stretched on canvas and framed like traditional fine art. Instead, her pieces hang from the ceiling in a free-form way.

“I can collaborate with the textile,” Omuku has said.

In her studio, located in Lagos, Nigeria, Omuku has a large collection of treasured, ceremonial sanyan from the past, as well as locally commissioned sanyan, a material similar in texture to thick linen.

“Unlike just a blank canvas, which most painters would begin with, she’s already beginning with something that also has history,” curator Natasha Becker said. “She wanted to bring those two things together – where she’s from and what she wants to express. Because she is addressing contemporary social issues in Lagos, it is like she has the past and the present in one object.”

Omuku discovered the artistic potential of the material once she returned to her native country in 2012, following six years of art education at University College London’s Slade School of Fine Art in England. During a residency in Senegal, she met with a group of women who were weaving cotton and creating textiles. They taught her how to spin cotton and weave. She became obsessed. It was an artistic breakthrough.

Becker, as curator of African art for FAMSF since 2020, has introduced rising artists from Africa to Bay Area audiences, including Lhola Amira and the sculptures of Leilah Babirye.

Nigerian painter and humanitarian Nengi Omuku (left) premiers her first solo U.S. exhibition “The Gathering” at the deYoung Museum this month. She met FAMSF curator of African Art Natasha Becker (right) a few years ago at the Contemporary Art Fair EXPO Chicago. Becker said she became enthralled with a work by Omuku, and advocated for her exhibition to come to San Francisco. Left photo courtesy of FAMSF, right photo by Noma Faingold.

“When I go to a museum, I want to discover something new or I want to see old favorites,” she said. “I just want to share my excitement with visitors about new artists.”

She first met Omuku a few years ago at the Contemporary Art Fair EXPO Chicago, where Becker became enthralled with a work by Omuku.

“It had such presence. Very atmospheric and very beautiful,” Becker said. “It drew me in.”

“The Gathering” exhibition brings together a sense of place and time. The imagination of the artist unfolds in the form of soothing skylines, thriving plants and flowers. The botanical representation is deeply personal, shaped by her mother’s horticultural work and her own experience working with her for five years, after returning to Nigeria. Omuku has also been shaped by the nature-driven paintings of Claude Monet.

With markings, perforations and seams embedded in the sanyan, it changes how the paint interacts with that surface, which is why it is important to Omuku that viewers experience both sides of the art by circling around it.

“You still see the texture of the textile coming through,” said Becker. “The paint sort of bleeds into that background. It’s like standing in front of a sculpture.”

In preparation for the exhibition, Becker went to Lagos for a studio visit. She spent time with Omuku while she was being interviewed remotely by FAMSF Digital Media Producer Khamisi Norwood, who hired a local crew and conducted an online interview at 3 a.m. (his time) for a short film to be featured in the exhibit.

“We collaborate pretty heavily with the curators,” Norwood said. “A lot of times we will follow the narrative of the exhibition and weave the narrative into the film. We’re giving visitors some insight into the artist and their process.”

The Lagos crew also shot footage of Omuku at an art fair, with Becker in tow. The event showcased one of her pieces and Omuku also led a workshop.

“I got to see the whole arc of her practice – from the studio to appearing at a public exhibition and leading a workshop,” Becker said.

Omuku maintains that her central concern is the “inner landscape.” In recent years, many of her works have been charged by a sense of sociopolitical crisis in Nigeria, along with what she describes as a corresponding mental health crisis.

In 2019, Omuku founded a non-profit in Lagos called The Art of Healing (TAOH). The organization brings artists into hospitals, where they run art therapy workshops and paint collaborative murals.

“It’s the most fulfilling part of my practice,” she said. “It’s one thing to express myself, but I feel like this is the true reason why I am painting.”

One key painting in the show, created during the COVID-19 pandemic in 2020, is called, “The Gathering.” She was spending a lot of time in her studio. Omuku observed a lot of impactful street activity from her fifth-floor balcony, including a building collapsing with people stuck under the rubble and protests due to police brutality.

“That painting is an important work because it speaks to all of the social upheaval,” Becker said. “At the same time, she was seeing these acts of care in the community. For her it marks a turn to making commentary of what’s happening socially and politically.”

From a distance, much of Omuku’s work seems folksy and serenely colorful. A closer look might reveal more thought-provoking scenarios. Specifically, “The Gathering” is a somber painting with a group of vaguely formed people standing next to a supine body, elevated to the height of their non-descriptive faces. The scene becomes more unsettling, should one linger.

Becker anticipates many more museum shows in the future for Omuku.

“It’s really just the beginning,” Becker said. “She is still experimenting. She is still growing.”

“Nengi Omuku: The Gathering” the artist’s first solo museum exhibition in the U.S., runs from June 27 to May 14, 2028, at the de Young Museum, 50 Hagiwara Tea Garden Dr. For more information, visit famsf.org.