Born: Chicago IL, 1967

Education: Earlham College, Richmond, IN, B.A., 1990

Currently lives and works in Brooklyn, NY.

2024

Matthew Marks Gallery, New York

2023

Institute of Contemporary Art, Boston. Traveling to Hirshhorn Museum and Sculpture Garden, Washington DC; Los Angeles County Museum of Art; California African American Museum, Los Angeles (catalogue)

2022

Sovereignty, 59th Venice Biennale, United States Pavilion (catalogue)
Glenstone, Potomac, MD

2021

Hauser & Wirth, Zurich

2020

David Kordansky Gallery, Los Angeles

2019

Brick House, High Line Plinth at the Spur, New York (outdoor installation)

Loophole of Retreat, Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum, Hugo Boss Prize 2018, New York (catalogue)

2018

Luhring Augustine, New York (catalogue)

2016

Hammer Projects, Hammer Museum, Los Angeles

inHarlem, The Studio Museum in Harlem, Marcus Garvey Park, New York

Simone Leigh and Chitra Ganesh: My Dreams, My Works, Must Wait Till After Hell, Crystal Bridges Museum of American Art, Bentonville, AR

Psychic Friends Network, Tate Modern, Tate Exchange, London

I ran to the rock to hide my face the rock cried out no hiding place, Kansas City Art Institute, Kansas City, MO

The Waiting Room, New Museum, New York

2015

Crop Rotation, Kentucky Museum of Art and Craft, Louisville, KY

Moulting, Tilton Gallery, New York

2014

Free People’s Medical Clinic, part of Funk, God, Jazz, and Medicine: Black Radical Brooklyn, Creative Time and Weeksville Heritage Center, Stuyvesant Mansion, Brooklyn, NY

Simone Leigh and Wolfgang Paalen, Gallery Wendi Norris, San Francisco

Gone South, Atlanta Contemporary Art Center

2013

Njideka Akunyili and Simone Leigh: I Always Face You Even When It Seems Otherwise, Tiwani Contemporary, London (catalogue)

2012

jam packed and jelly tight, Tilton Gallery, New York

What’s Her Face, Gavlak Gallery, Palm Beach, FL

You Don’t Know Where Her Mouth Has Been, The Kitchen, New York

2010

Divine Horsemen: Chitra Ganesh and Simone Leigh, Mason Gross Galleries at Civic Square, Rutgers University, New Brunswick, NJ

2009

Queen Bee, G Fine Art, Washington, DC

2008

if you wan fo’ lick old woman pot, you scratch him back, Rush Arts Gallery, New York

2004

Lisa DiLillo & Simone Leigh, Momenta Art, Brooklyn, NY

2024

Flight into Egypt: Black Artists and Ancient Egypt, 1876–Now, The Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York
For Dear Life: Art, Medicine, and Disability, Museum of Contemporary Art San Diego, CA
Ancestral, Museu de Arte Brasileira – Fundação Armando Alvares Penteado, São Paulo
When You See Me: Visibility in Contemporary Art/History, Dallas Museum of Art
Surrealism and Us: Caribbean and African Diasporic Artists Since 1940, Modern Art Museum of Fort Worth
Nancy Elizabeth Prophet: I will not bend an inch, RISD Museum, Providence. Travelling to Brooklyn Museum; Spelman College Museum of Art, Atlanta
Josephine Baker: Icon in Motion, Neue Nationalgalerie, Berlin

2023

Ecstatic: Selections from the Hammer Contemporary Collection, Hammer Museum, Los Angeles
Crosscurrents: Intercultural Conversations in Art, MW Gallery, Flint, MI
Musical Thinking: New Video Art and Sonic Strategies, Smithsonian American Art Museum, Washington DC

2022

Hear Me Now: The Black Potters of Old Edgefield, South Carolina, The Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York. Traveling to Museum of Fine Arts, Boston; University of Michigan Museum of Art, Ann Arbor; High Museum of Art, Atlanta (catalogue)
The Milk of Dreams, 59th International Art Exhibition of La Biennale di Venezia

2021

Calder Now, Kunsthal Rotterdam

Prospect.5, Prospect New Orleans

From Enslavement to Mass Incarceration, The Legacy Museum, Montgomery, AL

Black American Portraits, Los Angeles County Museum of Art

In-Between Days: Video from the Guggenheim Collections, Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum, New York

The Slipstream: Reflection, Resilience, and Resistance in the Art of Our Time, Brooklyn Museum, New York

New Time: Art and Feminisms in the 21st Century, University of California, Berkeley Art Museum and Pacific Film Archive

Grief and Grievance: Art and Mourning in America, New Museum, New York

Tense Conditions. A Presentation of the Contemporary Art Collection, Staatsgalerie, Stuttgart, Germany

2020

i’m yours: Encounters with Art in Our Times, Institute of Contemporary Art, Boston

Artists for New York, Hauser & Wirth, New York

Duro Olowu: Seeing Chicago, Museum of Contemporary Art, Chicago

2019

Making Knowing: Craft in Art, 1950–2019, Whitney Museum of American Art, New York

Contemporary Art: Five Propositions, Museum of Fine Arts, Boston

Driving Forces: Contemporary Art from the Collection of Ann and Ron Pizzuti, Columbus Museum of Art, OH

Fragile Figures: Beings and Time, 21c Nashville

She Persists. A Century of Women Artists in New York, Gracie Mansion, New York

The Contemporary Figure, Nelson-Atkins Museum of Art, Kansas City, MO

Currents, New York Historical Society, New York

Down Time: On the Art of Retreat, Smart Museum of Art, University of Chicago

Raid the Icebox, curated by Simone Leigh, RISD Museum of Art, Providence, RI

Whitney Biennial, Whitney Museum of American Art, New York (catalogue)

2018

Legacy of the Cool: A Tribute to Barkley L. Hendricks, Massachusetts College of Art and Design, Boston

Reclamation! Pan-African Works from the Beth Rudin DeWoody Collection, Taubman Museum of Art, Roanoke, VA

We Don’t Need Another Hero, KW Institute for Contemporary Art, 10th Berlin Biennale for Contemporary Art (catalogue)

2017

Trigger: Gender as a Tool and a Weapon, New Museum, New York (catalogue)

Arts of Global Africa, Newark Museum (permanent installation)

Blue Black, Pulitzer Arts Foundation, Saint Louis

Power: Work by African American Women from the Nineteenth Century to Now, Sprüth Magers, Los Angeles

Pursuing the Unpredictable: The New Museum 1977–2017, New Museum, New York

Regarding the Figure, Studio Museum in Harlem, New York

ReInventions, National Theater Exhibition Hall, Lagos, Nigeria

Round 46: BWA for BLM, curated by Simone Leigh, Project Row Houses, Houston

Significations, Provincial Center of Plastic Arts and Design, Havana

2016

Energy Charge: Connecting to Ana Mendieta, Arizona State University Art Museum, Tempe, AZ

The Grace Jones Project, Museum of the African Diaspora, San Francisco

In the Power of Your Care, The Shelley and Donald Rubin Foundation, The 8th Floor, New York

Mal Maison, Maccarone, New York

Unconventional Clay: Engaged in Change, Nelson-Atkins Museum of Art, Kansas City, MO

2015

Collaborative Archives: Connective Histories, Leroy Neiman Gallery, Columbia University School of the Arts, New York

Greater New York, MoMA PS1, New York

Ten Year Anniversary, Gavlak Gallery, Los Angeles

2014

As We Were Saying: Art and Identity in the Age of “Post”, Elizabeth Foundation for the Arts, New York

but that joke isn’t funny anymore…, Tilton Gallery, New York

Dak’Art Biennale dell’Art Africain Contemporain, 11th Internal Art Exhibition, Dakar, Senegal

The Shape of Things, Jack Shainman Gallery, New York

2013

Black in the Abstract: Part 2: Hard Edges/Soft Curves, Contemporary Arts Museum Houston

FUN HOUSE, Richard Gray Gallery, New York

approximately infinite universe, Museum of Contemporary Art San Diego, La Jolla, CA
Double Fortune, Double Trouble: Art for Twins among the Yoruba, Fowler Museum, University of California, Los Angeles

March On!, Brooklyn Academy of Music, New York

2012

Radical Presence: Black Performance in Contemporary Art, Contemporary Arts Museum Houston. Traveled to Grey Art Gallery, New York University; Studio Museum in Harlem, New York; Walker Art Center, Minneapolis, MN; and Yerba Buena Center for the Arts, San Francisco (catalogue).

Cleopatra’s Family Jewels, Family Business, New York

In the Making, Roberts & Tilton, Culver City, CA

Pose/Re-Pose: Figurative Works Then and Now, SCAD Museum of Art, Savannah, GA
Unevenness, National Gallery of Zimbabwe, Harare

Whitney Biennial, Whitney Museum of American Art, New York (catalogue)

2011

15 x 15, Rush Arts Gallery, New York

The Bearden Project, Studio Museum in Harlem, New York

Evidence of Accumulation: Artists in Residence 2010–11, Studio Museum in Harlem, New York

The February Show, Ogilvy & Mather, New York

SPACE: About a Dream, Kunsthalle Wien, Vienna

2010

Bunny Redux, Andy Warhol Museum, Pittsburgh

Comedy and Tragedy, Marvelli Gallery, New York

Digression, Hendershot Gallery, New York

Else, Jack Tilton Gallery, New York

Hair Tactics, Jersey City Museum, NJ

ves·sel, Brennan Gallery, Justice William J. Brennan Jr. Courthouse, Jersey City, NJ

2009

30 seconds off an inch, Studio Museum in Harlem, New York

AIM 29, Bronx Museum of the Arts, NY

Herd Thinner, Charest-Weinberg Gallery, Miami

In Practice Summer ’09, Sculpture Center, Long Island City, NY

Locus, MCLA Gallery 51, North Adams, MA

The Pleasure of Hating, Lisa Cooley, New York

Rockstone and Bootheel: Contemporary West Indian Art, Real Art Ways, Hartford

2008

Archeologies of Wonder, Real Art Ways, Hartford

The B-Sides, Aljira, a Center for Contemporary Art, Newark

Ethnographies of the Future, BRIC Rotunda Gallery, Brooklyn, NY

Ethnographies of the Future Remixed, Tides Foundation, New York

The Future As Disruption, The Kitchen, New York

Intransit, Moti Hasson Gallery, New York

Scratching the Surface VOL 1, L’appartement22, Rabat, Morocco

AVA Gallery, Cape Town, South Africa

2007

Defensive Mechanisms (part of INTERSECTIONS), Abrons Art Center, New York

Done by the Forces of Nature, John Jay College Gallery, New York

Material Culture, Longwood Art Gallery at Hostos, Bronx, NY

Red Badge of Courage, Newark Council for the Arts

Visual Jury, Fine Arts Work Center, Provincetown, MA

2006

Brooklyn Divas, Corridor Gallery, Brooklyn, NY

Henry Street Settlement, Abrons Art Center, New York

Wild Girls, Exit Art, New York

2005

Figures of Thinking: Convergences in Contemporary Cultures, John J McDonough Museum of Art, Youngstown, OH. Traveled to Richard E. Peeler Art Center, De Pauw University, Greencastle, IN; Tufts University Art Gallery, Medford, MA; Chicago Cultural Center; Joel and Lila Harnett Museum of Art, University of Richmond, VA; and Western Gallery, Western Washington University, Bellingham, WA (catalogue).

From the Studio: Wish You Were Here…, part of Co-dependent: Artists, Artist/Curators, & Curators Select Artists, The Living Room, Miami

Divine, LeRoy Neiman Gallery, Columbia University School of the Arts and Cathedral of St. John the Divine, New York

James E. Lewis Museum of Art, Morgan State University, Baltimore

Remnants and Relics: Reinterpretations in African American Art, Jamaica Center for Arts and Learning, NY

Watershed Kiln Gods, Gallery 1448, Baltimore (catalogue)

2004

Art Downtown: Connecting Collections, Deutsche Bank, New York

Baltimore Clayworks, Baltimore

Steuben Gallery, Pratt Institute, Brooklyn, NY

2003

Skylight Gallery, Bedford Stuyvesant Restoration Corporation, Brooklyn, NY

Nathan Cummings Foundation, New York

2002

Harvey B. Gantt Center for African American Arts + Culture, Charlotte, NC

Noel Gallery, Charlotte, NC

2001

SMIRK: Women, Art and Humor, Firehouse Gallery, Nassau Community College, New York (catalogue)

2022

Golden Lion for Best Participant, 59th Venice Biennale

2019

Fellowship, United States Artists, Chicago

2018

Grants to Artists, Foundation for Contemporary Arts, New York

Hugo Boss Prize, Solomon R. Guggenheim Foundation, New York

Residency, Vila Sul, Goethe-Institut Salvador-Bahia, Salvador-Bahia, Brazil

2017

Joyce Alexander Wein Artist Prize, Studio Museum in Harlem, New York

2016

A Blade of Grass Fellowship for Socially Engaged Art, New York

Herb Alpert Award for Visual Arts, Santa Monica

Anonymous Was a Woman Award, New York

John Simon Guggenheim Memorial Foundation Fellowship, New York

2014

Faculty, Asiko Program, Centre for Contemporary Art, Lagos, at Dak’Art 2014, Dakar, Senegal

2013

The Louis Comfort Tiffany Foundation Awards in Painting, Sculpture, Printmaking, Photography and Craft Media, New York

2012

Creative Capital Grant, New York

Facilitator, Asiko Program, Centre for Contemporary Art, Lagos, Nigeria

Lower Manhattan Cultural Council Michael Richards Award for Visual Arts, New York

2011

Joan Mitchell Foundation Grant, New York

Worth Residency, Bovina, NY

2010

Artist in Residence, Studio Museum in Harlem, New York

2009

Art Matters Grant, New York

Bronx Museum Artist in the Marketplace, New York

New York Foundation for the Arts Fellowship in Sculpture, New York

2008

Artist in Residence, Hunter College, New York

2007

Lower Manhattan Cultural Council Workspace Grant, New York

Visiting Artist, School of Visual Arts, New York

Astraea Lesbian Foundation for Justice Visual Arts Grant

2006

Artist-in-Residence, Henry Street Settlement, New York

2005

Artist-in-Residence, Greenwich House Pottery, New York

Herbert and Irene Wheeler Foundation Emergency Grants to Artists of Color, New York

2001

Watershed Center for the Ceramic Arts, Kiln God Fellowship, Watershed, ME

2000

Residency, Haystack Mountain School of Crafts, Deer Isle, ME