Lauren Redniss (b. 1974) is an American artist and writer. She was awarded a "Genius Grant" from the

John D. and Catherine T. MacArthur Foundation The John D. and Catherine T. MacArthur Foundation is a private foundation that makes grants and impact investments to support non-profit organizations in approximately 50 countries around the world. It has an endowment of $7.0 billion and p ...

in 2016.

Education

Redniss graduated from

Brown University Brown University is a private research university in Providence, Rhode Island. Brown is the seventh-oldest institution of higher education in the United States, founded in 1764 as the College in the English Colony of Rhode Island and Providenc ...

. She earned an MFA in Illustration as Visual Essay in 2000 from the School of Visual Arts.

Career

Redniss is the author of several works of visual non-fiction. ''Radioactive: Marie and Pierre Curie, A Tale of Love and Fallout'' (2010) was a finalist for the 2011

National Book Award The National Book Awards are a set of annual U.S. literary awards. At the final National Book Awards Ceremony every November, the National Book Foundation presents the National Book Awards and two lifetime achievement awards to authors. The Nat ...

, the first work of visual non-fiction to be so recognized. ''Thunder & Lightning: Weather Past, Present, Future'' (2015) won the 2016 PEN/E. O. Wilson Literary Science Writing Award.' The ''

New York Times ''The New York Times'' (''the Times'', ''NYT'', or the Gray Lady) is a daily newspaper based in New York City with a worldwide readership reported in 2020 to comprise a declining 840,000 paid print subscribers, and a growing 6 million paid d ...

'' called ''Oak Flat: A Fight for Sacred Land in the American West'' (2020) "astonishing" and "virtuosic." In 2021, the ''New Yorker'' magazine wrote, "In the world of arts and letters, there isn’t anyone quite like Lauren Redniss.... Reading her work is like poring over the notebooks of a hyper-literate, hyper-curious, and slightly mad artist." ''

The Sunday Telegraph ''The Sunday Telegraph'' is a British broadsheet newspaper, founded in February 1961 and published by the Telegraph Media Group, a division of Press Holdings. It is the sister paper of ''The Daily Telegraph ''The Daily Telegraph'', kn ...

'' has called Redniss' work "some of the most inventive, rigorous and beguiling published anywhere in the world." In its citation of ''Radioactive'', the National Book Foundation wrote: "Redniss' achievement is a celebration of the essential power of books to inform, charm, and transport. In marrying the graphic and visual arts with biography and cultural history, she has expanded the realm of non-fiction." Redniss is also the author of ''Century Girl: 100 Years in the Life of Doris Eaton Travis, Last Living Star of Ziegfeld Follies'' (2006). Her writing and drawing have appeared in numerous publications including the

, which nominated her work for the Pulitzer Prize. Redniss has been a

New America Foundation New America, formerly the New America Foundation, is a think tank in the United States founded in 1999. It focuses on a range of public policy issues, including national security studies, technology, asset building, health, gender, energy, educa ...

fellow, a Guggenheim Foundation fellow, a fellow at the

New York Public Library The New York Public Library (NYPL) is a public library system in New York City. With nearly 53 million items and 92 locations, the New York Public Library is the second largest public library in the United States (behind the Library of Congress ...

’s Cullman Center for Scholars & Writers, and Artist-in-Residence at the

American Museum of Natural History The American Museum of Natural History (abbreviated as AMNH) is a natural history museum on the Upper West Side of Manhattan in New York City. In Theodore Roosevelt Park, across the street from Central Park, the museum complex comprises 26 inter ...

. She teaches at the

Parsons School of Design Parsons School of Design, known colloquially as Parsons, is a private art and design college located in the Greenwich Village neighborhood of New York City. Founded in 1896 after a group of progressive artists broke away from established Manhatt ...

in New York City.

In other media

In 2019, a major motion picture adaptation of ''

Radioactive Radioactive decay (also known as nuclear decay, radioactivity, radioactive disintegration, or nuclear disintegration) is the process by which an unstable atomic nucleus loses energy by radiation. A material containing unstable nuclei is consid ...

'', premiered at the Toronto International Film Festival. The film, directed by Marjane Satrapi, starred Rosamond Pike as Marie Curie,

Sam Riley Samuel Peter W. Riley (born 8 January 1980) is an English actor and singer.James Mottram: The only people for me are the mad ones. ''Independent on Sunday: The New Review'', 30 January 2011, pp 10–13 He is best known for his performance in t ...

as Pierre Curie, and

Anya Taylor-Joy Anya-Josephine Marie Taylor-Joy ( ; born 16 April 1996) is an actress. She has won several accolades, including a Golden Globe Award and a Screen Actors Guild Award, in addition to a nomination for a Primetime Emmy Award. In 2021, she was featu ...

as Irène Curie. In 2020, Redniss created a large installation at

Lincoln Center Lincoln Center for the Performing Arts (also simply known as Lincoln Center) is a complex of buildings in the Lincoln Square neighborhood on the Upper West Side of Manhattan. It has thirty indoor and outdoor facilities and is host to 5 millio ...

for

New York City Ballet New York City Ballet (NYCB) is a ballet company founded in 1948 by choreographer George Balanchine and Lincoln Kirstein. Balanchine and Jerome Robbins are considered the founding choreographers of the company. Léon Barzin was the company' ...

. Her installation featured portraits and oral histories of over 100 people who work behind the scenes at the theater.

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Redniss, Lauren 1974 births 21st-century American women American women writers American women artists Living people MacArthur Fellows School of Visual Arts alumni