To love is to heal, to heal is to love. — Dr. Melz Owusu
Bernice Mulenga’s work documents and pays tribute to Black queer life in the UK and beyond, offering a conduit for visibility, collective memory and meaningful connection. Mulenga’s practice emerged in response to the enduring lack of representation and critical engagement for Black, Asian and other minoritised and racialised communities within the UK’s visual art landscape, and to the marginalisation of Black voices, even within broader discourses led by other global majority groups. Drawing on frameworks of queer, postcolonial and critical race theory—which highlight how public and cultural spaces are shaped by racialised and gendered systemic oppression— Mulenga’s work makes a case for the importance of being present and occupying space with intention, both individually and collectively. Nightlife—and the rich aesthetics and performative traditions of fashion, music and dance therein—has long served as a vital cultural and political arena where Black and queer communities have fostered solidarity, self determination and sanctuary.
The first gallery room introduces key themes in Mulenga’s practice: movement, performance and tender moments of self-expression and intimacy. A large-scale wall print, Eternal Salvation (2024), taken with 35mm SLR camera, depicts a scene from WET, a lesbian club night in South London. Opposite, a trio of photographs — New Year, Same Feels (2024), Beyond (2021), and Abondance (2023) (left to right; each 120 x 80 cm) — document a New Year’s celebration at the To The Left Can’t Get Right party with Paschelle Brown and Malika Green; the Beyond Kiki Ball in South London; and a moment from Abondance’s 25th birthday party, where she dances with her brother. Mulenga’s titles often reference the soundtracks that accompanied the making of the images, rooting memory in sonic resonance. These spotlighted works serve as anchor points for what follows, reflecting both spontaneity and intention—moments suspended between chance and choreography.
In the second room, an installation of more than 350 photographs (all 10 x 15 cm) unfolds as both a living archive of #friendsonfilm, and a tribute to those depicted. Most of the images are captioned with a location, date, name, or personal message. Mulenga frames the authorship of these images as shared, presenting photography not as a form of possession, but as an act of mutual affirmation. The final work in the exhibition is a self-portrait, part of an ongoing series that contrasts with Mulenga’s documentary works, marking quiet moments of solitude and introspection, and refocusing attention to the subjecthood and viewpoint of the artist.
(EN) Bernice Mulenga, LMK WHEN U REACH, 2025. Installation view at Auto Italia, London, UK. Courtesy the artist and Auto Italia. Photographer: Jack Elliot Edwards.
(EN) Bernice Mulenga, LMK WHEN U REACH, 2025. Installation view at Auto Italia, London, UK. Courtesy the artist and Auto Italia. Photographer: Jack Elliot Edwards.
(EN) Bernice Mulenga, LMK WHEN U REACH, 2025. Installation view at Auto Italia, London, UK. Courtesy the artist and Auto Italia. Photographer: Jack Elliot Edwards.
(EN) Bernice Mulenga, LMK WHEN U REACH, 2025. Installation view at Auto Italia, London, UK. Courtesy the artist and Auto Italia. Photographer: Jack Elliot Edwards.
(EN) Bernice Mulenga, Eternal Salvation, 2024. Installation view LMK WHEN U REACH, Auto Italia, London, UK. Courtesy the artist and Auto Italia. Photographer: Jack Elliot Edwards.
(EN) Bernice Mulenga, Abondance, 2023. Installation view LMK WHEN U REACH, Auto Italia, London, UK. Courtesy the artist and Auto Italia. Photographer: Jack Elliot Edwards.
(EN) Bernice Mulenga, LMK WHEN U REACH, 2025. Installation view at Auto Italia, London, UK. Courtesy the artist and Auto Italia. Photographer: Jack Elliot Edwards.
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