Mwangi Hutter
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Ingrid Mwangi (born 1975) is a German artist, of Kenyan-German descent. She works with photography, sculpture and in multimedia, performance, and installation art. In 2005, she co-founded ''Mwangi Hutter.''


Early life and education

Ingrid Njeri Mwangi was born in 1975 in
Nairobi Nairobi is the Capital city, capital and largest city of Kenya. The city lies in the south-central part of Kenya, at an elevation of . The name is derived from the Maasai language, Maasai phrase , which translates to 'place of cool waters', a ...
,
Kenya Kenya, officially the Republic of Kenya, is a country located in East Africa. With an estimated population of more than 52.4 million as of mid-2024, Kenya is the 27th-most-populous country in the world and the 7th most populous in Africa. ...
to a German mother and a Kenyan father. She moved to Germany at the age of 15. She attended
Hochschule der Bildenden Künste Saar The Hochschule der Bildenden Künste Saar or HBKsaar, (English: ''Saar College of Fine Arts'') is an art and design university in the German State of Saarland. The degree course offers a choice of different topics: Fine arts, communication desi ...
in
Saarbrücken Saarbrücken (; Rhenish Franconian: ''Sabrigge'' ; ; ; ; ) is the capital and largest List of cities and towns in Germany, city of the state of Saarland, Germany. Saarbrücken has 181,959 inhabitants and is Saarland's administrative, commerci ...
, Germany, from 1996–2002.


Career

Mwangi works and lives in
Berlin Berlin ( ; ) is the Capital of Germany, capital and largest city of Germany, by both area and List of cities in Germany by population, population. With 3.7 million inhabitants, it has the List of cities in the European Union by population withi ...
,
Germany Germany, officially the Federal Republic of Germany, is a country in Central Europe. It lies between the Baltic Sea and the North Sea to the north and the Alps to the south. Its sixteen States of Germany, constituent states have a total popu ...
with her husband and collaborator Robert Hutter. They have four children. Mwangi's work is concerned with social conventions and identity. She participated in the 2007
Brooklyn Museum The Brooklyn Museum is an art museum in the New York City borough (New York City), borough of Brooklyn. At , the museum is New York City's second largest and contains an art collection with around 500,000 objects. Located near the Prospect Heig ...
exhibition ''
Global Feminisms ''Global Feminisms'' was a feminist art exhibition that originally premiered at the Elizabeth A. Sackler Center for Feminist Art at the Brooklyn Museum, New York City, United States, in March 2007. The exhibition was co-curated by Maura Reilly and ...
''. Her 2001 series of photographs, ''Static Drift'', was included. The work makes use of images evoking national and racial identities projected onto her body. Mwangi's 2000 work ''Neger Don't Call Me'' features photographs of her face covered with masks made from her
dreadlocks Dreadlocks, also known as dreads or locs, are a Hairstyle, hairstyle made of rope-like strands of matted hair. Dreadlocks can form naturally in Hair#Texture, very curly hair, or they can be created with techniques like twisting, Backcombing, ba ...
.


''Mwangi Hutter''

In 2005, she and her husband Robert Hutter merged their biographies and names to form one artist, ''Mwangi Hutter''. As a creative strategy to resist fixed notions of identity based upon gender, race, and cultural backgrounds, ''Mwangi Hutter'' strategically merged names and biographies to become one artist. They consciously use themselves as the sounding board to reflect on changing societal realities, creating an aesthetics of self-knowledge and interrelationship. ''Mwangi Hutter'' reflect on the subjects of border-crossing and finding identity, which both can be understood in a political, as well as a very personal, intimate sense. Their works can be seen as a vision of unification and the pacification of contrasts: female-male, African-European, black-white and the borders separating you and me.


Exhibitions


Solo exhibitions

*2002: Ingrid Mwangi - Stadtgalerie Saarbrücken, Saarbrücken, Germany *2006: Man of War - Video, Installation, Fotografie - Kunstverein Ingolstadt, Ingolstadt, Germany *2007: IngridMwangiRobertHutter: Select Videos, 2006-2007 - BRIC Rotunda Gallery, New York City, New York, United States *2007: MASK - James Cohan Gallery, New York City, New York, United States *2007: GOTH - Reality of the Departed World - Yokohama Museum of Art, Nishi-ku, Yokohama, Japan *2008: IngridMwangiRobertHutter - Along the Horizon - Galleria Il Trifoglio Nero, Genoa, Italy *2009: IngridMwangiRobertHutter: Masked - Emerson Gallery at
Hamilton College Hamilton College is a Private college, private Liberal arts colleges in the United States, liberal arts college in Clinton, Oneida County, New York, Clinton, New York. It was established as the Hamilton-Oneida Academy in 1793 and received its c ...
, Clinton, New York, United States *2009: In the Eye of the Beholder - Darb 1718 Contemporary Art and Culture Center, Cairo, Egypt *2009: Intruders -
Goethe-Institut The Goethe-Institut (; GI, ''Goethe Institute'') is a Nonprofit organization, nonprofit German culture, cultural organization operational worldwide with more than 150 cultural centres, promoting the study of the German language abroad and en ...
Nairobi, Nairobi, Kenya *2009: Sleepers on the way - Goethe-Institut Tansania, Dar es Salaam, Tanzania *2011: Constant Triumph -
Spelman College Museum of Fine Art The Spelman College Museum of Fine Art is a museum located on the Spelman College campus in Atlanta. Since its inception, the museum has been housed in the Camille O. Hanks Cosby Academic Center named after philanthropist Camille Cosby, who had ...
, Atlanta, Georgia, United States *2013: Mwangi Hutter - Single Entities / @ Salon - ALEXANDER OCHS GALLERIES BERLIN , BEIJING, Berlin, China


References


External links


Official website
Book chapter about Mwangi Hutter: by BM Van Hoesen in "German Colonialism in Africa and its Legacies", 2023 {{DEFAULTSORT:Mwangi, Ingrid 1975 births Living people German contemporary artists German people of Kenyan descent Kenyan artists Kenyan people of German descent Kenyan women artists Artists from Nairobi Hochschule der Bildenden Künste Saar alumni