Nottingham Contemporary

Your Ears Later Will Know to Listen

Current Exhibition
an abstract blue and green toned painting
  • Satch Hoyt, This Dream is Serial Not Token, 2017. Courtesy the artist.
Sat 31 May – Sun 7 Sep

In Summer 2025, Nottingham Contemporary will present Your Ears Later Will Know to Listen, a thematic group exhibition and associated live programme which considers how sound travels and transitions through cross-cultural identities, histories, and futures. Drawing on writer and cultural historian Saidiya Hartman’s methods of “foraging” and “disfiguration” the exhibition will feature sound as the leading medium to consider how artists have listened to and reimagined complex histories.

This ambitious group exhibition and accompanying live programme presents artworks that “listen back” to uncover silenced or lost histories while also creating new moments to receive and hold historical dissonance. Across all four galleries at Nottingham Contemporary, Your Ears Later Will Know to Listen aims to consider the past as a historical ground to incite emancipatory expressions and practices of reconstitution and solidarity, while inviting audiences to experience and reflect on the many positions from which we listen.

Your Ears Later Will Know to Listen presents international, multi-generational practices, including new commissions by Satch Hoyt, Raheel Khan and Dylan Robinson, alongside works by Nguyễn Trinh Thi, Hong-Kai Wang, Simnikiwe Buhlungu, amongst others. The artworks span a range of media including moving image, multi-channel immersive sound installations, reworked historical analogue sound, sculpture, textiles, painting, drawing and performance.

A dark gallery room with three screens playing films. In the middle are two small benches.
A tv screen on the floor with 4 sets of headphones plugged in and spread out across a patterned woven rug.
An art installation in an open gallery space of speakers and audio tech positioned on top of the each other in the middle of the room. There is a woven rug and stools in front.
A gallery space with different artworks displayed on the wall. There are 4 stools and a shelf with headphones on.
A dark gallery room with a screen on the back wall. There are artworks on display on the surrounding walls.
There is an artwork made from metal poles that are displayed on the wall from floor to ceiling in a pyramid shape. There is also a cabinet and audio artwork displayed against another wall, there are two benches in the space.
A gallery space painted red with a low bench with record players and headphones on display. On the walls are shelves with records on display.
A dimly lit gallery space with large colourful paintings on display.
Two paintings hung on a gallery wall. One is a square painting of a music studio and the other is a much smaller rectangle of a stage set up.
Three large woven textile artworks hung on display from large wooden beams.
A gallery space showing a wooden seat in the middle. Behind the seat against the gallery wall is an installation of a tape player on the floor, with tape looping along the gallery wall.
Exhibition:
Your Ears Later Will Know to Listen
Dates:
31 May 2025 – 7 Sep 2025
Audio Recordings:
Artists:

Hellen Ascoli, Simnikiwe Buhlungu, Sky Hopinka, Satch Hoyt, Yee I-Lann, Arturo Kameya, Raheel Khan, Zahra Malkani, John Peffer, Dylan Robinson, Nguyễn Trinh Thi, Hajra Waheed and Hong-Kai Wang.

Credits:

This exhibition is the outcome of a partnership between Nottingham Contemporary and University of Nottingham initially conceived and developed with Paul Hegarty as an AHRC/Midlands4Cities funded Collaborative Doctoral Award with PhD candidate Andrea Zarza Canova.

The exhibition and associated live programme are co-curated by Nottingham Contemporary and Andrea Zarza Canova.

Your Ears Later Will Know to Listen was developed with insights from a group of critical friends including:

Dylan Robinson (Associate Professor at the University of British Columbia School of Music), Bhavisha Panchia (Johannesburg based independent curator and researcher of visual and audio culture), Pablo José Ramírez (curator at Hammer Museum, Los Angeles), Kamila Metwaly (Berlin/Cairo based music journalist, electronic musician and curator) and Merv Espina (Manila based artist and curator).

Supporters:

Generously supported by BACKLIT Gallery (for Raheel Khan), New Art Exchange's Reside residency programme (for Raheel Khan), the National Culture and Arts Foundation, Taiwan (for Hong-Kai Wang), Goethe Institut (for Satch Hoyt), GRIMM (for Arturo Kameya), Silverlens (for Yee I-Lann) and the Your Ears Later Will Know to Listen Exhibition Circle.
With thanks to John E Wright for the printing of Hong-Kai Wang's research image reproductions and John Peffer's textile display.

Commissioning Circle:

Nissreen Darawish, Gabriela Galcerán, Hamza Serafi, Carlo Solari and Paula del Sol, and those who wish to remain anonymous.

Supported by:

Related

Your Ears Later Will Know to Listen: NTS Radio Broadcast
Satch Hoyt, This Dream is Serial Not Token, 2017. Courtesy the artist.
Your Ears Will Later Know to Listen: Teacher notes, Resources and Information
Children doing activities in a gallery space.
Listening Walk with Dr Andrew Brown Walkthrough
Wed 3 Sep, 1pm–2pm
Visitors laying on the floor of Bonnington Gallery with headphones on.
Summer Family Activities: Sounds Around Past, Family Activities, Workshop
Tue 29 Jul – Thu 21 Aug, Tues, Weds & Thurs 10am-12pm & 1pm-3pm
A parent and child sitting together reading in a large workshop space.
Lost & Found Listening Walk with Dr Helen Foster Past, Walkthrough
Wed 16 Jul, 1pm–2pm
a street sign on a red brick building reading "broad marsh"
Free Teacher CPD Session - Sonic Memories: Exploring sound and ways of listening Past, Workshop
Thu 5 Jun, 4.30pm–6.30pm
a group of teachers crouching on the floor talking to each other
1525: Printmaking Workshop Past, Young People
Wed 23 Jul, 4pm–6pm
A photo taken in birds-eye view of a group of people screen printing together on a workshop table.
Curators' Walkthrough: Your Ears Later Will Know to Listen Past, Walkthrough
Wed 18 Jun, 1pm–2pm
2 people sitting in front of a speaker installation in a gallery
12.30 Talks Walkthrough
Tue 10 Jun – Sat 6 Sep, Tuesdays, Thursdays and Saturdays, 12.30pm
a gallery assistant greeting a visitor
Listening Workshop with Dylan Robinson: wó:thel sq'eq'ó telhlímelh, sthí:ystxwes te syó:ys Past, Event
Sun 6 Jul, 12pm–3pm
hungry listening book on a patterned wallpaper
Walkthrough with Ambivalent Archives, CRASSH, University of Cambridge Past, Walkthrough
Wed 2 Jul, 1pm–2pm
collage materials on a table
Listening Session: Reimagining In Conversation by Hannan Jones and Shamica Ruddock Past, Performance
Fri 25 Jul, 7pm
A photograph of a performance set up, sound equipment on a table with a red projector installation in the background
Exhibition Launch Party: Your Ears Later Will Know to Listen Past, Event
Fri 30 May, 6.30pm-11pm, Galleries last entry at 9pm
a poster with text reading "your ears later will know to listen exhibition launch"
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