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Pamela Phatsimo Sunstrum

Selected Artworks

Crayon, pencil, and oil on linen
Work: 107 x 190 cm
Pencil, oil and acrylic on wood panel
Work: 152 x 152 cm
Unavailable
Pencil, oil and acrylic on wood panel
Work: 152 x 152 cm
Unavailable
Pencil, oil and acrylic on wood panel
Work: 182 x 122 cm
Unavailable
10 channel video installation with sound, screens, projection and wall drawing
Single channel animation with sound

About

Pamela Phatsimo Sunstrum image

Pamela Phatsimo Sunstrum’s (b. 1980, Mochudi, Botswana) work alludes to mythology, geology and theories on the nature of the universe. Her work includes imagery that reflects the diverse genealogies of her experience living in different parts of Africa, Southeast Asia, and the U.S. as well as ongoing research in ethnography, ecology, and quantum physics. The artist’s boundary-crossing practice centres Black female identity in the discourse of postcolonialism and neocolonialism, highlighting the contributions of overlooked historical figures while emphasising modes of knowledge and communication beyond the status quo.

In 2024, a major new solo exhibition opened at KM21 Den Haag, including a new large scale diptych painting within an installation that included items from the museum’s furniture collection. Sunstrum also presented her first solo exhibition titled ‘It Will End in Tears’, at a major UK institution, the Barbican Centre’s The Curve. Sunstrum took her life-size wood grain panoramas round the bend of the gallery, building a narrativised sequence with elements of film noir, crime fiction and pure drama.

Recent solo exhibitions include: It Will End In Tears, Barbican London, UK (2024); You’ll be sorry, Goodman Gallery, Johannesburg, South Africa (2023), The Pavillion, London Mithraeum, Bloomberg SPACE, London (2023); All my seven faces, Contemporary Art Center, Cincinnati (2019); Michaelis School for the Arts at the University of Cape Town (2018); Interlochen Centre for the Arts, Interlochen (2016).

Group exhibitions and biennales include: Born in Flames: Feminist Futures, The Bronx Museum of the Arts NY, USA (2021); WITNESS: Afro Perspectives from the Jorge M. Pérez Collection, El Espacio 23, Miami, USA (2020).

Collections include: Fries Museum, Leeuwarden, Hessel Museum at Bard College, New York, A4 Arts Foundation, Cape Town; The Fitzwilliam Museum, Cambridge; University of Cape Town, Cape Town; Deutsche Bank Collection, Frankfurt; El Espacio 23, Miami; FRAC des Pays de la Loire Contemporary Collection, Carquefou; University of South Africa (UNISA) Art Collection.

Sunstrum lives and works in The Hague, Netherlands.

Download full CV

Exhibitions

Basel Artfair
13 June - 16 June 2024

Films

Press & News

press

Two very different Frieze Week shows by southern African women artists explore ‘how we might break apart knowledge’

press

It Will End in Tears, Pamela Phatsimo Sunstrum The Barbican Curve (September 18, 2024 to January 5, 2025)