On July 1 1999, Dr Nina Simone gave a rare performance, fated to be one of her last in Britain. After the show, in a state of transcendent awe, Warren Ellis (the legendary composer, Bad Seed, and eccentric extraordinaire) crept onto the stage and took Simone’s piece of chewed gum from the piano, wrapped it in her stage towel, and took it home. The gum remained with Ellis for twenty years — a sacred totem, his creative muse — until 2019, when Nick Cave asked him if he had anything he could contribute to his Stranger Than Kindness exhibition…

Nina Simone’s Gum reveals how something seemingly insignificant can form beautiful connections between people. It is a story about the meaning we bestow upon objects and experiences, and how these things become imbued with spirituality. It is a celebration of artistic process and the incomparable power of the art borne from it—of friendship, understanding, and love.