The Nasher Sculpture Center proudly announces Nigerian/Belgian artist Otobong Nkanga as the recipient of the 2025 Nasher Prize.
Otobong Nkanga. Courtesy of the Nasher Sculpture Centre.
Nkanga will be the first Nasher Prize laureate recognised in the new biennial format – a change made to give the museum and the laureate more time to show works at the Nasher, produce a printed monograph, and better communicate their importance in the field of sculpture. Under the reimagined prize cycle, Nkanga will be presented the Renzo Piano-designed award in Dallas on April 5, 2025, alongside an exhibition and a published monograph.
Through a broad range of materials, used to orchestrate an equally broad range of artistic practices, the 2025 Nasher Prize Laureate, Otobong Nkanga, weaves together powerful works that delve into the complex, often fragile relationships between humans, the land, and its resources, touching on issues of consumption, global circulation, connectivity, and care.
Otobong Nkanga, was born in Kano, Nigeria in 1974, grew up in Lagos and Paris, and lives and works in Antwerp, Belgium. Over the past 20 years she has been producing evocative works that speak to migration and her own movement in the world, the exhaustive use of planetary resources, and the interconnectedness of people and the land. Her enigmatic art, which relies on extensive research into the places it inhabits, frequently uses raw materials such as minerals, metals, stones, and plants to elicit new meanings, stored memories, and emotional connections for her audience.
“The work of Otobong Nkanga makes manifest the myriad connections – historical, sociological, economic, cultural, and spiritual – that we have to the materials that comprise our lives,” says Nasher Sculpture Center Director Jeremy Strick. “Delving deeply into the variegated meanings these materials take on, Nkanga’s work makes clear the essential place of sculpture in contemporary life.”
For more information, please visit the Nasher Sculpture Centre.
