Primer / Onyeka Igwe

‘Primers’ offer an opportunity to hear from artists during the development of new projects with The Common Guild. As part of the upcoming project ‘anywhere in the universe’, this event presents commissioned artist Onyeka Igwe. Igwe will screen her film ‘The Miracle on George Green’ and discuss her practice to date.

'Primers' are presented in collaboration with Dr. Dominic Paterson at the University of Glasgow.

About the artist /

Onyeka Igwe is an artist and researcher working between cinema and installation, living and working in London, UK. Her work is animated by the question “how do we live together?” with a particular interest in sensorial, spatial, and non-canonical ways of knowing. She uses embodiment, voice, archives, narration and text to create structural “figure-of-eights”, a format that exposes a multiplicity of narratives.

Solo exhibitions and commissions include ‘A Repertoire of Protest (No Dance, No Palaver)’, MoMA PS1, New York (2023) ; ‘The Miracle on George Green’, Highline, New York (2022); ‘a so-called archive’, LUX, London; ‘THE REAL STORY IS WHAT’S IN THAT ROOM’, Mercer Union, Toronto, Canada, (both 2021), ‘There Were Two Brothers’, Jerwood Arts, (2019), and ‘Corrections’ with Aliya Pabani, Trinity Square Video, Toronto, Canada (2018).

In 2022 Igwe was nominated for the Jarman Award and shortlisted for the Max Mara Art Prize for Women 2022–2024. She was awarded the 2021 Foundwork Artist Prize; the 2020 Arts Foundation Futures Award for Experimental Short Film; and was the 2019 recipient of the Berwick New Cinema Award in 2019.