Sikkens Prize 2026 for internationally renowned artist Otobong Nkanga

10 July 2026

Otobong Nkanga (1974, Kano, Nigeria) will receive the Sikkens Prize 2026 on Monday, 26 October. The Sikkens Prize honours an artist or collective who is pioneering in the field of colour. The prize is awarded to Otobong Nkanga because, in a time that calls for both imagination and responsibility, she shows that the power of colour begins where it awakens - in the earth, in the community, in life itself. She will also be honoured with the exhibition Humus Blues at Singer Laren, opening immediately after the award ceremony and on view for four months.

The Sikkens Prize 2026 is awarded to Otobong Nkanga (1974, Kano, Nigeria) because she reveals where colour truly comes from. In her sculptures, tapestries, drawings and installations - shown from Paris and Lausanne to Kanazawa, New York and Venice - pigments and minerals are not passive matter but active witnesses: of landscapes and lives, of extraction and reconstruction. Her work connects body and landscape, the local and the global, the personal and the political. In an era that cries out for imagination and responsibility, she shows that the power of colour begins where it originates - in the earth, in the community, in life itself. In doing so, her practice aligns closely with the mission of the Sikkens Prize.

For the first time, the Sikkens Foundation honours the Sikkens Prize laureate with an exhibition. Otobong Nkanga’s solo exhibition Humus Blues is on view from 27 October 2026 to 28 February 2027 at Singer Laren. In her work she explores the interconnection between people, landscape and raw materials, as well as themes such as identity, power and change. Featuring sculptures, textiles, drawings, paintings, photographs and poetry, the exhibition offers a multifaceted introduction to her body of work, in which colour plays a key role – a quality for which the Sikkens Prize jury has recognised her. Monumental works by Nkanga will also be on display in the 30-year anniversary exhibition ReflAction at the Art Space of the AkzoNobel Art Foundation in Amsterdam.

Explore more via Sikkens Prize.

Image: Unearthed – Twilight, 2021, woven textile (yarns: trevira, elirex, outdoor polypropylene, multifilament, mohair, monofilament, fulgaren, sidero, cotton, acryl, viscose), 350 x 600 cm. Defares Collection.