Sarah Ndangi

About

Sarah Ndangi, in full Sarah Ndangi Bunga, was born in Kinshasa in 1996 and came to painting from the sciences. She finished her humanités in biology and chemistry before choosing art, took her degree in Plastic Arts, painting option, at the Académie des Beaux-Arts de Kinshasa in 2020, and has worked in acrylics and oils since.

Her subject is influence, and the paintings are built to stage it. Geometric shapes press against realist passages; warm tones sit against cool ones; the grounds are invented rather than observed. The contrasts are the concept. Influence, as Ndangi works with it, arrives from two directions at once: the external forces that act on a person, positive and negative, and the internal drive that shapes perception, behavior, and dreams. A canvas of hers is the meeting point of the two.

The clearest statement of it is Exprime-Toi (2023), the subject of a Meet the Artwork feature here: a singer built from the same green and yellow lines as the patterned field around her, figure and ground made of one material, with only the guitar and the microphone painted solid. A person is always influenced by her surroundings, Ndangi says of it, for better and for worse. What the woman holds is what pulls her free.

She exhibits regularly. Her presence here also touches something Kitokongo says openly: the public face of Congolese painting has stayed male far too long. The roster should look like the talent, and with Ndangi it does a little more.

This profile is her address online: the portfolio below holds the paintings, and the paintings hold the argument.

Portfolio