Sula Bermúdez-Silverman

Sula Bermúdez-Silverman draws our attention to material culture—the world of objects and architecture that surrounds us—illuminating histories that are often obscured or elided even as they are present in our everyday lives. Using iconic forms such as a saddle or a dollhouse, she explores how objects can become symbols, and through transformations of scale and material, she destabilizes the way they represent and narrate the past. The artist employs a variety of specific materials—for instance, sugar and insect specimens—as metaphoric devices to think through colonialism and its attendant ideas and tangible effects, with particular interest in the Americas.

Sula Bermúdez-Silverman (b. 1993, New York) received a BA from Bard College in 2015 and an MFA from Yale School of Art in 2018. Her work has been shown in solo exhibitions at Matthew Brown, Los Angeles (2023); Friends Indeed, San Francisco (2022); Murmurs, Los Angeles (2021); California African American Museum, Los Angeles (2020); Visual Arts Center, University of Texas at Austin (2018); and Project Row Houses, Houston (2015). Recent group presentations include those at Craft Contemporary, Los Angeles (2022); Institute of Contemporary Art, Los Angeles (2022); Japanese American Cultural & Community Center, Los Angeles (2022); and Torrance Art Museum, California (2020), among other venues. She is a recipient of grants from the Foundation for Contemporary Arts (2021), Black Artist Fund (2020), and Artist Grant Organization (2019).