Laylah Ali (born 1968Baker, Alex (2007) ''Laylah Ali: Typology''. Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts. p. 47. ) is a contemporary

visual artist The visual arts are art forms such as painting, drawing, printmaking, sculpture, ceramics, photography, video, filmmaking, design, crafts and architecture. Many artistic disciplines such as performing arts, conceptual art, and textile arts al ...

known for paintings in which ambiguous race relations are depicted with a graphic clarity and cartoon strip format.

Early life and education

In her youth, Ali originally intended to be a lawyer or a doctor. Ali received her

B.A. Bachelor of arts (BA or AB; from the Latin ', ', or ') is a bachelor's degree awarded for an undergraduate program in the arts, or, in some cases, other disciplines. A Bachelor of Arts degree course is generally completed in three or four years ...

(English and Studio Art) from

Williams College Williams College is a Private college, private liberal arts colleges in the United States, liberal arts college in Williamstown, Massachusetts. It was established as a men's college in 1793 with funds from the estate of Ephraim Williams, a col ...

, Williamstown, MA in 1991. She participated in th
Whitney Independent Study Program
at the

Whitney Museum of American Art The Whitney Museum of American Art, known informally as "The Whitney", is an art museum in the Meatpacking District and West Village neighborhoods of Manhattan in New York City. It was founded in 1930 by Gertrude Vanderbilt Whitney (1875–1942), ...

, New York City in 1992, and completed a

residency Residency may refer to: * Domicile (law), the act of establishing or maintaining a residence in a given place ** Permanent residency, indefinite residence within a country despite not having citizenship * Residency (medicine), a stage of postgrad ...

at the

Skowhegan School of Painting and Sculpture The Skowhegan School of Painting and Sculpture is an artists residency located in Madison, Maine, just outside of Skowhegan. Every year, the program accepts online applications from emerging artists from November through January, and selects 65 t ...

, Skowhegan, ME in 1993. Ali received her M.F.A. in 1994 from the

Sam Fox School of Design & Visual Arts The Sam Fox School of Design & Visual Arts is a part of Washington University in St. Louis. The Sam Fox School was founded in 2006 by uniting the academic units of Architecture and Art with the University's Mildred Lane Kemper Art Museum to creat ...

Washington University in St. Louis Washington University in St. Louis (WashU or WUSTL) is a private research university with its main campus in St. Louis County, and Clayton, Missouri. Founded in 1853, the university is named after George Washington. Washington University is r ...

. She lives and works in

Williamstown, Massachusetts Williamstown is a town in the northern part of Berkshire County, in the northwest corner of Massachusetts, United States. It shares a border with Vermont to the north and New York to the west. It is part of the Pittsfield, Massachusetts Metropolit ...

, and is currently a professor at

Work

In Ali's earlier work, she would draw or paint something violent. She focused more on the action than the violence itself. In her current work, there is not a lot of focus on the act; she is more attentive to what happens before and after. The works are small scale

gouache Gouache (; ), body color, or opaque watercolor is a water-medium paint consisting of natural pigment, water, a binding agent (usually gum arabic or dextrin), and sometimes additional inert material. Gouache is designed to be opaque. Gouache h ...

paintings and drawings on paper. She is known to prepare for many months, planning out every detail so there is no room for mistakes. Ali's work is based on life experiences. Although one may not be able to tell, she says all of her work holds meaning and that what's in her mind transcends from her hands on paper. About the performative nature of her work, Ali says, "The paintings can be like crude stages or sets, the figures like characters in a play. I think of them equally as characters and figures."

The Greenheads Series

The subject of Ali's most well-known gouache paintings are the ''Greenheads – ''characters designed to minimize or eliminate categorical differences of gender, height, age, and in some ways race. Ali created more than 80 of these paintings between 1996 and 2005. Ali drew on imagery and topics from newspapers, such as images of protest signs or world leaders hugging, but tweaked the stories in order to create something distant and new. Ali designed the characters and images to be specific and yet vague. They have meaning from Ali herself but the viewer brings their own references to interpret the image as well. Ali designed the characters to look human-like but not quite human so that they would be removed from our world and social context. They have a socio-political meaning yet they exist outside of our world.

Acephalous

Since 2015, Ali has been working on a series of paintings she calls Acephalous, featuring figures she describes as gender conscious, potentially sexual or sexualized, some of which have racial characteristics and some of which do not have heads. "They are on an endless, determined trek, a multi-part journey," she says. "It has elements of a forced migration."

Collaborations

Laylah Ali has collaborated with dancer/ choreographer Dean Moss at

The Kitchen The Kitchen is a non-profit, multi-disciplinary avant-garde performance and experimental art institution located at 512 West 19th Street, between Tenth and Eleventh Avenues in the Chelsea neighborhood of Manhattan, New York City. It was founde ...

in 2005 with ''Figures on a Field'' and in 2014 with ''johnbrown''. In 2002, the

Museum of Modern Art The Museum of Modern Art (MoMA) is an art museum located in Midtown Manhattan, New York City, on 53rd Street between Fifth and Sixth Avenues. It plays a major role in developing and collecting modern art, and is often identified as one of ...

, New York, commissioned Ali to create a wordless graphic novelette. In 2020 during the pandemic Ali was expected to complete a project with the Tamarind Press in New Mexico. The safety measures of COVID-19 demanded that the press and artist shift their working relationship to a virtual one. Instead of a project in-person they worked to utilize the mail to send work-in-progress back and forth.

Collections

Ali’s works are included in the permanent collections of numerous public institutions, including the

Albright-Knox Art Gallery The Buffalo AKG Art Museum, formerly known as the Albright–Knox Art Gallery, is an art museum at 1285 Elmwood Avenue, Buffalo, New York, in Delaware Park. the museum's Elmwood Avenue campus is temporarily closed for construction. It hosted e ...

, Buffalo, NY; the

Museum of Contemporary Art, Chicago The Museum of Contemporary Art (MCA) Chicago is a contemporary art museum near Water Tower Place in downtown Chicago in Cook County, Illinois, United States. The museum, which was established in 1967, is one of the world's largest contemporary ...

and the

Walker Art Center The Walker Art Center is a multidisciplinary contemporary art center in the Lowry Hill neighborhood of Minneapolis, Minnesota, United States. The Walker is one of the most-visited modern and contemporary art museums in the United States and, t ...

, Minneapolis, MN, among many others.

Exhibitions

Solo and group exhibitions

Laylah Ali has exhibited in both the

Venice Biennial The Venice Biennale (; it, La Biennale di Venezia) is an international cultural exhibition hosted annually in Venice, Italy by the Biennale Foundation. The biennale has been organised every year since 1895, which makes it the oldest of ...

(2003) and the

Whitney Biennial The Whitney Biennial is a biennial exhibition of contemporary American art, typically by young and lesser known artists, on display at the Whitney Museum of American Art in New York City, United States. The event began as an annual exhibition in ...

(2004). Other exhibitions are as follows: * 2017: ''Laylah Ali: Paintings and Drawings'',

Hallwalls Contemporary Arts Center Hallwalls Contemporary Arts Center (aka Hallwalls) is a non-profit art organization located in Buffalo, New York. Since 1974, Hallwalls has shown and shows the work of contemporary artists of diverse backgrounds who work in film, video, literature ...

, Buffalo, NY, November 10, 2017 — December 22, 2017 * 2015-2016:

University of Michigan Museum of Art The University of Michigan Museum of Art in Ann Arbor, Michigan with is one of the largest university art museums in the United States. Built as a war memorial in 1909 for the university's fallen alumni from the Civil War, Alumni Memorial Hall ori ...

, Ann Arbor, Michigan, October 17, 2015 – January 31, 2016 * 2015-2016: ''ASSISTED'', Kavi Gupta Gallery, Chicago, IL, September 12, 2015 – January 16, 2016 * 2015:

Blanton Museum of Art The Jack S. Blanton Museum of Art (often referred to as the Blanton or the BMA) at the University of Texas at Austin is one of the largest university art museums in the U.S. with 189,340 square feet devoted to temporary exhibitions, permanent coll ...

, University of Texas at Austin, Austin, Texas, February 17–May 15, 2016 * 2015: ''Come as You Are: Art of the 1990s,''

Montclair Art Museum The Montclair Art Museum (MAM) is located in Montclair, New Jersey, United States, a few miles west of New York City. Since it opened in 1914 as the first museum in New Jersey that granted access to the public and the first dedicated solely to a ...

, Montclair, New Jersey, February 8–May 17 * 2015:

Telfair Museum of Art Telfair Museums, in the historic district of Savannah, Georgia, was the first public art museum in the Southern United States. Founded through the bequest of Mary Telfair (1791–1875), a prominent local citizen, and operated by the Georgia Histo ...

, Savannah, GA, June 12 – September 20 * 2015: ''The Acephalous Series,''

PAUL KASMIN GALLERY The Kasmin Gallery, formerly known as the Paul Kasmin Gallery, is a New York City fine art gallery, founded in SoHo in 1989. History The gallery was founded by its namesake as the Paul Kasmin Gallery in 1989 and was initially housed at 74 Grand S ...

, New York * 2014: ''Personal Histories'',

Seattle Art Museum The Seattle Art Museum (commonly known as SAM) is an art museum located in Seattle, Washington, United States. It operates three major facilities: its main museum in downtown Seattle; the Seattle Asian Art Museum (SAAM) in Volunteer Park on Cap ...

, Seattle, Washington, July 5 – May 3, 2014 Up Every Evening, Season gallery, Seattle, Washington, spring * 2013: ''Laylah Ali: The Greenheads Series. ''

Herbert F. Johnson Museum of Art The Herbert F. Johnson Museum of Art ("The Johnson Museum") is an art museum located on the northwest corner of the Arts Quad on the main campus of Cornell University in Ithaca, New York. Its collection includes two windows from Frank Lloyd W ...

Cornell University Cornell University is a private statutory land-grant research university based in Ithaca, New York. It is a member of the Ivy League. Founded in 1865 by Ezra Cornell and Andrew Dickson White, Cornell was founded with the intention to teach an ...

, NY. * 2013: ''Laylah Ali: The Greenheads Series. ''

Weisman Art Museum The Frederick R. Weisman Art Museum is an art museum at the University of Minnesota in Minneapolis, Minnesota. Founded in 1934 as University Gallery, the museum was originally housed in an upper floor of the university's Northrop Auditorium. In 19 ...

at the University of Minnesota; * 2013: ''The Shadows Took Shape'',

Studio Museum in Harlem The Studio Museum in Harlem is an American art museum devoted to the work of artists of African descent. The museum's galleries are currently closed in preparation for a building project that will replace the current building, located at 144 W ...

, New York, NY (catalog) * 2013: ''Ambiguous Histories: Selected Art from the Exit Art Portfolios'', Art, Design, and Architecture Museum,

University of Santa Barbara A university () is an educational institution, institution of higher education, higher (or Tertiary education, tertiary) education and research which awards academic degrees in several Discipline (academia), academic disciplines. Universities ty ...

, CA * 2013: ''Laylah Ali & Gerald Cyrus'',

Pennsylvania College of Art and Design The Pennsylvania College of Art & Design (PCA&D) is a private, non-profit art and design college in Lancaster, Pennsylvania. The college offers Bachelor of Fine Arts (BFA) degrees and certificates, a continuing education program with professional ...

Gallery, Lancaster, PA Direct Democracy,

Monash University Museum of Art The Monash University Museum of Art (MUMA), formerly the Monash University Gallery, is a contemporary art museum on Monash University's Caulfield campus on Dandenong Road, Melbourne, Australia. History The Museum grew out of a number of ear ...

, Melbourne, Australia (catalog) * 2013: ''Painting Between the Lines'',

Williams College Museum of Art The Williams College Museum of Art (WCMA) is a college-affiliated art museum in Williamstown, Massachusetts. It is located on the campus of Williams College, and is close to the Massachusetts Museum of Contemporary Art (MASS MoCA) and the Clark Ar ...

, Williamstown, MA (catalog) * 2013: ''Revelations: Examining Democracy'', Broad Art Museum,

Michigan State University Michigan State University (Michigan State, MSU) is a public university, public Land-grant university, land-grant research university in East Lansing, Michigan. It was founded in 1855 as the Agricultural College of the State of Michigan, the fi ...

, East Lansing, MI * 2012: ''Thenceforward, and Forever Free'',

Haggerty Museum of Art The Patrick and Beatrice Haggerty Museum of Art, sometimes referred to simply as "the Haggerty", is located at 13th and Clybourn Streets on the campus of Marquette University in downtown Milwaukee, Wisconsin, United States. The museum opened in 1 ...

Marquette University Marquette University () is a Private university, private Society of Jesus, Jesuit research university in Milwaukee, Wisconsin. Established by the Society of Jesus as Marquette College on August 28, 1881, it was founded by John Henni, John Martin ...

, Milwaukee, WI * 2012: ''Under the Influence: The Comics'',

Lehman College Lehman College is a public college in the Bronx borough of New York City. Founded in 1931 as the Bronx campus of Hunter College, the school became an independent college within CUNY in September 1967. The college is named after Herbert H. Lehma ...

Art Gallery, Bronx, NY * 2012: ''The Female Gaze: Women Artists Making Their World'',

Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts The Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts (PAFA) is a museum and private art school in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania.San Francisco Museum of Modern Art The San Francisco Museum of Modern Art (SFMOMA) is a modern and contemporary art museum located in San Francisco, California. A nonprofit organization, SFMOMA holds an internationally recognized collection of modern and contemporary art, and was ...

, San Francisco, CA (catalog) * 2011: ''Painting Between the Lines'', CCA

Wattis Institute for Contemporary Arts Established in 1998, the Wattis Institute for Contemporary Arts is a contemporary art center in San Francisco, California, US, and part of the California College of the Arts. It holds exhibitions, lectures, and symposia, releases publications, and ...

, San Francisco, CA (catalog) * 2011: ''Relatos extraordinarios: Laylah Ali and Abigail Lazkoz'', Sala Parpallo,

Valencia, Spain Valencia ( va, València) is the capital of the autonomous community of Valencia and the third-most populated municipality in Spain, with 791,413 inhabitants. It is also the capital of the province of the same name. The wider urban area also ...

(catalog) * 2011: ''Vivid: Female Currents in Painting'',

Schroeder Romero & Shredder Schroeder Romero & Shredder is a contemporary art gallery located in the Chelsea neighborhood of New York City. Gallerist Lisa Schroeder has professed a preference for conceptual and sociopolitical art. Notable exhibitions have included those of ...

, New York, NY * 2010: ''Works on paper from the MCA collection. ''

; * 2010: ''Collected: Reflections on the Permanent Collection'',

The Studio Museum in Harlem The Studio Museum in Harlem is an American art museum devoted to the work of artists of African descent. The museum's galleries are currently closed in preparation for a building project that will replace the current building, located at 144 W ...

, New York, NY * 2009: ''Off the Beaten Path: Violence, Women and Art, Art Works for Change''—travelled to Stenersenmuseet,

Oslo, Norway Oslo ( , , or ; sma, Oslove) is the capital and most populous city of Norway. It constitutes both a county and a municipality. The municipality of Oslo had a population of in 2022, while the city's greater urban area had a population of i ...

(2009); University Art Gallery,

University of California, San Diego The University of California, San Diego (UC San Diego or colloquially, UCSD) is a public university, public Land-grant university, land-grant research university in San Diego, California. Established in 1960 near the pre-existing Scripps Insti ...

, CA (2009-2010); Centro Cultural Tijuana,

Mexico Mexico (Spanish: México), officially the United Mexican States, is a country in the southern portion of North America. It is bordered to the north by the United States; to the south and west by the Pacific Ocean; to the southeast by Guatema ...

(2010); Museo Universitario del Chopo, Mexico (2010);

Chicago Cultural Center The Chicago Cultural Center, opened in 1897, is a Chicago Landmark building operated by Chicago's Department of Cultural Affairs and Special Events that houses the city's official reception venue where the Mayor of Chicago has welcomed preside ...

, Chicago, IL (2010); Global Health Odyssey Museum,

Centers for Disease Control and Prevention The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) is the national public health agency of the United States. It is a United States federal agency, under the Department of Health and Human Services, and is headquartered in Atlanta, Georgi ...

, Atlanta, GA (2011) Paper Trail: A Decade of Acquisitions from the

Figge Art Museum The Figge Art Museum is an art museum in Davenport, Iowa. The Figge, as it is commonly known, has an encyclopedic collection and serves as the major art museum for the eastern Iowa and western Illinois region. The Figge works closely with sever ...

, Davenport, IA Massachusetts Review: Celebrating Fifty Years of Covers, University Gallery, Fine Arts Center,

University of Massachusetts The University of Massachusetts is the five-campus public university system and the only public research system in the Commonwealth of Massachusetts. The university system includes five campuses (Amherst, Boston, Dartmouth, Lowell, and a medica ...

Amherst, MA Amherst () is a town in Hampshire County, Massachusetts, United States, in the Connecticut River valley. As of the 2020 census, the population was 39,263, making it the highest populated municipality in Hampshire County (although the county seat ...

If I Didn’t Care: Generational Artists Discuss Cultural Histories,

The Park School The Park School is an independent day school in Brookline, Massachusetts, for boys and girls in Pre-Kindergarten through eighth grade. Founded in 1888 as Miss Pierce's School, it is a 34-acre campus in Brookline, Massachusetts near Jamaica Pond. ...

, Baltimore, MD * 2008: ''Laylah Ali: Notes/Drawings/Untitled Afflictions'',

DeCordova Sculpture Park and Museum The deCordova Sculpture Park and Museum is a 30-acre sculpture park and contemporary art museum on the shore of Flint's Pond in Lincoln, Massachusetts, 20 miles northwest of Boston. It was established in 1950. It is the largest park of its kind ...

: August 30, 2008 - January 4, 2009 * 2008: ''Beyond Drawing: Constructed Realities'',

Ohio University Ohio University is a Public university, public research university in Athens, Ohio. The first university chartered by an Act of Congress and the first to be chartered in Ohio, the university was chartered in 1787 by the Congress of the Confeder ...

Art Gallery, Athens Fantastical Imaginings,

Delaware Center for the Contemporary Arts The Delaware Contemporary is Delaware's only contemporary art museum. Founded in 1979 as the Delaware Center for Contemporary Arts (DCCA) it rebranded to its current name in 2015. It is a non-collecting museum focused on work by local, regional, a ...

, Wilmington— travelled to Julio Fine Arts Gallery, Loyola University Maryland, Baltimore (2009); Political Circus,

Florida Atlantic University Florida Atlantic University (Florida Atlantic or FAU) is a Public university, public research university with its main campus in Boca Raton, Florida, and satellite campuses in Dania Beach, Florida, Dania Beach, Davie, Florida, Davie, Fort Lauderd ...

, Ritter Art Gallery, Boca Raton; On the Margins,

Mildred Lane Kemper Art Museum The Mildred Lane Kemper Art Museum is an art museum located on the campus of Washington University in St. Louis, within the university's Sam Fox School of Design & Visual Arts. Founded in 1881 as the St. Louis School and Museum of Fine Arts, it ...

, Washington University in St. Louis, Missouri (catalog); Disguised, Rotwand Gallery, Zurich, Switzerland; Out of Shape, The

Frances Lehman Loeb Art Center The Frances Lehman Loeb Art Center, commonly known as The Loeb, is a teaching museum, major art repository, and exhibition space on the campus of Vassar College, in Poughkeepsie, New York, United States. It was founded in 1864 as the Vassar Colleg ...

, Vassar College, Poughkeepsie, New York (catalog) * 2008: Taking Possession,

University of Arkansas at Little Rock The University of Arkansas at Little Rock (UA Little Rock) is a public research university in Little Rock, Arkansas. Established as Little Rock Junior College by the Little Rock School District in 1927, the institution became a private four-year ...

Perverted by Theater, Apex Art, New York, NY; Pandora's Box,

Dunlop Art Gallery The Regina Public Library is the citywide public library system of Regina, Saskatchewan, Canada. Services *Information and reference services *Access to full text databases *Community information *Internet access *Reader's advisory services ...

, Regina,

Saskatchewan, Canada Saskatchewan ( ; ) is a Provinces and territories of Canada, province in Western Canada, western Canada, bordered on the west by Alberta, on the north by the Northwest Territories, on the east by Manitoba, to the northeast by Nunavut, and on t ...

(catalog) * 2008: U-turn Quadrennial for Contemporary Art,

Copenhagen, Denmark Copenhagen ( or .; da, København ) is the capital and most populous city of Denmark, with a proper population of around 815.000 in the last quarter of 2022; and some 1.370,000 in the urban area; and the wider Copenhagen metropolitan ar ...

(catalog) * 2008: Text/Messages: Books by Artists,

, Minneapolis * 2007: ''the kiss and other warriors. '' Institute of International Visual Arts, London; * 2006: Alien Nation,

Institute of Contemporary Arts The Institute of Contemporary Arts (ICA) is an artistic and cultural centre on The Mall in London, just off Trafalgar Square. Located within Nash House, part of Carlton House Terrace, near the Duke of York Steps and Admiralty Arch, the ICA c ...

, London—traveled to

Manchester Art Gallery Manchester Art Gallery, formerly Manchester City Art Gallery, is a publicly owned art museum on Mosley Street in Manchester city centre. The main gallery premises were built for a learned society in 1823 and today its collection occupies three c ...

, Manchester, England;

Sainsbury Centre for Visual Arts The Sainsbury Centre is an art gallery and museum located on the campus of the University of East Anglia, Norwich, England. The building, which contains a collection of world art, was one of the first major public buildings to be designed by th ...

, Norwich, England (catalog) Cult Fiction,

Hayward Gallery The Hayward Gallery is an art gallery within the Southbank Centre in central London, England and part of an area of major arts venues on the South Bank of the River Thames. It is sited adjacent to the other Southbank Centre buildings (the Roy ...

, London, England (catalog) * 2006: Counterparts: Contemporary Painters and Their Influences,

Virginia Museum of Contemporary Art The Virginia Museum of Contemporary Art (abbreviated as "Virginia MOCA") is a contemporary art museum in Virginia Beach, Virginia, USA, located at 2200 Parks Avenue, near the oceanfront resort area. The museum is on a landscaped campus adjacent t ...

, Virginia Beach, VA (catalog) Running Around the Pool,

Florida State University Florida State University (FSU) is a public research university in Tallahassee, Florida. It is a senior member of the State University System of Florida. Founded in 1851, it is located on the oldest continuous site of higher education in the st ...

Museum of Fine Arts, Tallahassee. FL (catalog) XXS, Sommer Contemporary Art Gallery, Tel Aviv, Israel American Matrix, Harn Museum of Art,

University of Florida The University of Florida (Florida or UF) is a public land-grant research university in Gainesville, Florida. It is a senior member of the State University System of Florida, traces its origins to 1853, and has operated continuously on its ...

, Gainesville, FL Black Alphabet, Zacheta National Gallery of Art, Warsaw, Poland (catalog) Having New Eyes,

Aspen Art Museum Founded in 1979, the Aspen Art Museum (AAM) is a non-collecting contemporary art museum located in Aspen, Colorado. AAM exhibitions include drawings, paintings, sculptures, multimedia installations and electronic media. Aspen Art Museum Building ...

, Aspen, CO * 2005: The Body. The Ruin,

Ian Potter Museum of Art The Ian Potter Museum of Art at the University of Melbourne in Melbourne, Australia was established in 1972. It houses the art collection of the University of Melbourne. Current director, Kelly Gellatly, was appointed in 2013. It is not to be con ...

University of Melbourne The University of Melbourne is a public research university located in Melbourne, Australia. Founded in 1853, it is Australia's second oldest university and the oldest in Victoria. Its main campus is located in Parkville, an inner suburb nor ...

, Melbourne, Australia (catalog) Cut,

Susanne Vielmetter Los Angeles Projects Vielmetter Los Angeles (formerly Susanne Vielmetter Los Angeles Projects) is a contemporary art gallery founded in 2000 by Susanne Vielmetter. The gallery is located in downtown Los Angeles. History Susanne Vielmetter launched her first gallery i ...

, Los Angeles, CA Vivi-Seccion: Dibujo Contemporaneo, Museo de Arte Carillo Gil, Mexico City, Mexico * 2004:

2004,

, New York, NY (catalog) Material Witness,

Museum of Contemporary Art, Cleveland A museum ( ; plural museums or, rarely, musea) is a building or institution that cares for and displays a collection of artifacts and other objects of artistic, cultural, historical, or scientific importance. Many public museums make thes ...

, OH (catalog) The 10 Commandments, KW Institute for Contemporary Art, Berlin, Germany * 2004: ''Laylah Ali: Types. ''

Contemporary Art Museum St. Louis The Contemporary Art Museum St. Louis is an art museum for contemporary art, located in St. Louis, Missouri. Known informally as the CAM St. Louis, the museum is located at 3750 Washington Boulevard in the Grand Center Arts District. The buildin ...

; * 2003: Crosscurrents at Century’s End: Selections from the

Neuberger Berman Neuberger Berman Group LLC is a private, independent, employee-owned investment management firm. The firm manages equities, fixed income, private equity and hedge fund portfolios for global institutional investors, advisors and high-net-worth in ...

Art Collection,

Henry Art Gallery The Henry Art Gallery ("The Henry") is a contemporary art museum located on the University of Washington campus in Seattle, Washington. Located on the west edge of the university's campus along 15th Avenue N.E. in the University District, it wa ...

, Seattle, WA—travelled to Norton Museum of Art, West Palm Beach, FL;

Tampa Museum of Art The Tampa Museum of Art is located in downtown Tampa, Florida. It exhibits modern and contemporary art, as well as Greek, Roman, and Etruscan antiquities. The museum was founded in 1979 and debuted an award-winning new building in 2010 just north ...

, Tampa, FL;

, Chicago, IL (catalog) * 2003: ''Fault Lines: Contemporary African Art and Shifting Landscapes'',

Venice Biennale The Venice Biennale (; it, La Biennale di Venezia) is an international cultural exhibition hosted annually in Venice, Italy by the Biennale Foundation. The biennale has been organised every year since 1895, which makes it the oldest of ...

, Venice, Italy (catalog) * 2003: ''me & more'', Kunstmuseum Luzern,

Switzerland ). Swiss law does not designate a ''capital'' as such, but the federal parliament and government are installed in Bern, while other federal institutions, such as the federal courts, are in other cities (Bellinzona, Lausanne, Luzern, Neuchâtel ...

(catalog) * 2003: ''Splat Boom Pow! The Influence of Cartoons in Contemporary Art'',

Contemporary Arts Museum Contemporary Arts Museum Houston is a not-for-profit institution in the Museum District, Houston, Texas, founded in 1948, dedicated to presenting contemporary art to the public. As a non-collecting museum, it strives to provide a forum for visual ...

, Houston, TX—traveled to Institute of Contemporary Art, Boston, MA;

Wexner Center for the Arts The Wexner Center for the Arts is the Ohio State University's "multidisciplinary, international laboratory for the exploration and advancement of contemporary art". The Wexner Center opened in November 1989, named in honor of the father of Limite ...

, Columbus, OH (catalog) * 2002: ''Projects 75: Laylah Ali. ''

Museum of Modern Art, New York The Museum of Modern Art (MoMA) is an art museum located in Midtown Manhattan, New York City, on 53rd Street (Manhattan), 53rd Street between Fifth Avenue, Fifth and Sixth Avenues. It plays a major role in developing and collecting modern art, ...

; * 2002: ''Comic Release: Negotiating Identity for a New Generation'',

Carnegie Mellon University Carnegie Mellon University (CMU) is a private research university in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. One of its predecessors was established in 1900 by Andrew Carnegie as the Carnegie Technical Schools; it became the Carnegie Institute of Technology ...

, Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania—traveled to Contemporary Arts Center, New Orleans, LA;

University of North Texas The University of North Texas (UNT) is a public research university in Denton, Texas. It was founded as a nonsectarian, coeducational, private teachers college in 1890 and was formally adopted by the state 11 years later."Denton Normal School," ...

Gallery, Denton;

Western Washington University Western Washington University (WWU or Western) is a public university in Bellingham, Washington. The northernmost university in the contiguous United States, WWU was founded in 1893 as the state-funded New Whatcom Normal School, succeeding a pri ...

, Bellingham (catalog) Fantasyland, D’Amelio Terras, New York, NY First Person Singular,

, Seattle, WA Painting in Boston,

, Lincoln, MA * 2001: ''Laylah Ali. '' Institute of Contemporary Art, Boston; * 2001: ''Against the Wall: Painting Against the Grid, Surface, Frame'', Institute of Contemporary Art,

University of Pennsylvania The University of Pennsylvania (also known as Penn or UPenn) is a private research university in Philadelphia. It is the fourth-oldest institution of higher education in the United States and is ranked among the highest-regarded universitie ...

, PA Freestyle, The Studio Museum in Harlem, New York, NY (catalog) * 2001: ''FRESH: The

Altoids Altoids are a brand of mints, sold primarily in distinctive metal tins. The brand was created by the London-based Smith & Company in the 1780s, and became part of the Callard & Bowser company in the 19th century. Their advertising slogan is "The ...

Curiously Strong Collection 1998-2000'',

New Museum of Contemporary Art The New Museum of Contemporary Art, founded in 1977 by Marcia Tucker, is a museum in New York City at 235 Bowery, on Manhattan's Lower East Side. History The museum originally opened in a space in the Graduate Center of the then-named New Scho ...

, New York, NY Guarene Arte 2001, Palazzo Re Rebaudengo,

Turin, Italy Turin ( , Piedmontese: ; it, Torino ) is a city and an important business and cultural centre in Northern Italy. It is the capital city of Piedmont and of the Metropolitan City of Turin, and was the first Italian capital from 1861 to 1865. T ...

* 2001: ''A Work in Progress: Selections from the New Museum Collection'',

, New York, NY * 2000: ''Art on Paper 2000'',

Weatherspoon Art Museum The Weatherspoon Art Museum is located at the University of North Carolina at Greensboro and is one of the largest collections of modern and contemporary art in the southeast with a focus on American art. Its programming includes fifteen or more e ...

University of North Carolina The University of North Carolina is the multi-campus public university system for the state of North Carolina. Overseeing the state's 16 public universities and the NC School of Science and Mathematics, it is commonly referred to as the UNC Sy ...

, Greensboro, NC * 1999: ''Bizarro World! The Parallel Universes of Comics and Fine Art'',

Cornell Fine Arts Museum The Rollins Museum of Art is located on the Winter Park campus of Rollins College and is the only teaching museum in the greater Orlando area. The museum houses more than 5,000 objects ranging from antiquity through contemporary eras, including ...

Rollins College Rollins College is a private college in Winter Park, Florida. It was founded in November 1885 and has about 30 undergraduate majors and several graduate programs. It is Florida's fourth oldest post-secondary institution. History Rollins Colle ...

, Winter Park, FL Collectors Collect Contemporary, Institute of Contemporary Art, Boston, MA The 1999 DeCordova Annual Exhibition,

, Lincoln, MA (catalog) * 1999: ''No Place Rather than Here'',

303 Gallery 303 Gallery is an art gallery in Manhattan, New York. It was established in 1984 by owner and director Lisa Spellman, described by art critic Jerry Saltz as "one of the greatest New York gallerists of our time". The gallery hosts contemporary works ...

, New York, NY * 1998: ''Paradise 8'',

Exit Art Exit Art was a non-profit cultural center that ran from 1982 to 2012 that exhibited contemporary visual art, installation, video, theater, and performance in New York City, United States. In its last location in Hell's Kitchen, Manhattan, it was a ...

, New York, NY Posing,

Boston Center for the Arts Boston (), officially the City of Boston, is the state capital and most populous city of the Commonwealth of Massachusetts, as well as the cultural and financial center of the New England region of the United States. It is the 24th- most po ...

, Boston, MA Selections Summer 1998,

The Drawing Center The Drawing Center is a Manhattan, New York, museum and a nonprofit exhibition space that focuses on the exhibition of drawings, both historical and contemporary. History The Drawing Center was founded by former assistant curator of drawings at ...

, New York, NY Telling Tales, Atrium Gallery,

University of Connecticut The University of Connecticut (UConn) is a public land-grant research university in Storrs, Connecticut, a village in the town of Mansfield. The primary 4,400-acre (17.8 km2) campus is in Storrs, approximately a half hour's drive from Hart ...

, Storrs, CT

Awards

Ali has been awarded a number of grants, residencies and awards, including the

Joan Mitchell Foundation Joan Mitchell (February 12, 1925 – October 30, 1992) was an American artist who worked primarily in painting and printmaking, and also used pastel and made other works on paper. She was an active participant in the New York School of artis ...

Painters and Sculptors Grant in 2008, the Joan Mitchell Foundation Residency in 2018, and the

United States Artists United States Artists (USA) is a national arts funding organization based in Chicago. USA is dedicated to supporting living artists and cultural practitioners across the United States by granting unrestricted awards. Mission The organization' ...

Residency.

References

External links

Laylah Ali: Meaning , Art21 "Exclusive"artnet Asks: Laylah AliLaylah Ali , Dia Art Foundation
{{DEFAULTSORT:Ali, Laylah 1968 births Living people American contemporary painters African-American contemporary artists American contemporary artists African-American women artists African-American painters American women painters Painters from New York (state) 21st-century American painters 21st-century American women artists Skowhegan School of Painting and Sculpture alumni 21st-century African-American women 21st-century African-American artists 20th-century African-American people 20th-century African-American women Sam Fox School of Design & Visual Arts alumni Williams College alumni Williams College faculty