2021 International Artist Honoree Simone Leigh’s practice incorporates sculpture, video, and installation; all are informed by her ongoing exploration of black female-identified subjectivity. Leigh works in a mode she describes as auto-ethnographic. Her objects often employ materials and forms traditionally associated with African art; her performance- influenced installations create spaces where historical precedent and self-determination commingle. Through her investigations of visual overlaps between cultures, time periods, and geographies, she confronts and examines ideas of the female body, race, beauty, and community.
Leigh will represent the United States at the next Venice Biennale in April 2022. The first African-American woman to receive this honor, among the art world’s most prestigious, she was selected by the U.S. Department of State’s Bureau of Educational and Cultural Affairs on the recommendation of museum professionals and artists convened by the National Endowment for the Arts.
