Coup d’état (2003/2018) is a suspended sculpture of a monumental needle grounded by hand-dyed thread, was born as part of a performance that no one but the artist and the photographer saw in 2003 at her final presentation at the Rijksakademie in the Netherlands. It later featured in other installations and video works such as Sustained Suture (2003) and Surgical Hit (2003). Nkanga created a set of needles, which could be seen as instruments of healing and violence, through a process of heating and beating stainless steel, sculpting these forms during the height of the George W. Bush era which announced the invasion of Iraq. The term “surgical hit” was used to describe the precise destruction of targets, perverting the Hippocratic ideals behind the field of surgery. Nkanga looks at the duality of the needle and its ability to pierce, sever, join, and entangle, as well as its function as an instrument of transition.