Lorna Simpson is a multimedia artist whose photo-text installations from the 1980s and 1990s, such as Guarded Conditions and Square Deal, interrogate identity, gender, race, and representation.
Lorna Simpson is an American artist born in Brooklyn, New York. She studied photography at the School of Visual Arts in New York and received her MFA from the University of California, San Diego. She came to prominence in the 1980s and early 1990s with photo-text works that challenge conventional representations of African American women and the politics of looking.
Simpson's signature works juxtapose found or staged photographs with enigmatic text fragments, creating layered narratives about identity, memory, and history. Over time, her practice has expanded from photography into film, video, painting, drawing, audio, and sculpture, consistently probing the construction of identity and the gaps in historical memory.
In 1990, Simpson was one of the first African American women to exhibit at the Venice Biennale. Her work continues to be shown internationally, and she is represented by Hauser & Wirth. Recent exhibition-related programming includes the gallery's Learning Exchange in Los Angeles and an Education Lab at Hauser & Wirth Menorca, reflecting her ongoing engagement with education and community dialogue.
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