Alumna Ellie Ga ’98 Exhibits in 2019 Whitney Biennial
Ellie Ga ’98, MMC Studio Art alumna and internationally recognized artist, is one of just 75 artists selected to exhibit in the Whitney Biennial, the country’s most important showcase of contemporary art.
The longest-running survey of American art, the Whitney Biennial has taken place every two years since 1973, showcasing work in all media. The 2019 Whitney Biennial features 75 artists and collectives working in painting, sculpture, installation, film and video, photography, performance, and sound. Selection in the Whitney Biennial, according to The New York Times, “instantly marks an artist as a figure at the forefront of American contemporary art.”
Ga works in the intersections of performance, photography, video, sculpture, and installation. Her artwork is displayed in the collection of the Guggenheim Museum of Art, and she has had solo exhibitions at the Newark Museum of Art; Albright-Knox Art Gallery, Buffalo, New York; and the M-Museum, Leuven, Belgium. Her group exhibitions include Subject Index, Konstmuseum, Malmö, Sweden; Momentum Biennial, Moss, Norway: Imagine Being Here Now; Walking, Drifting, Dragging, New Museum of Contemporary Art, New York; and Arctic, Louisiana Museum of Modern Art, Humlebæk, Denmark.
Ga received her BA in Studio Art from Marymount Manhattan College and her MFA from Hunter College. She is represented by Bureau Gallery in New York and lives in Stockholm, Sweden.
The Whitney Biennial runs from May 17–September 22, 2019. Ga’s work, Gyres 1–3, explores the form of a gyre, a spiraling current on the ocean’s surface that circulates debris and throws it ashore. In a review of the exhibition, Holland Cotter, co-chief art critic of The New York Times, says:
“And in a truly extraordinary video triptych, Ellie Ga, an American artist living in Sweden, weaves together archaeology, oceanography and social justice by recording the recovery of ancient remains from the Aegean, the tidal drift of Japanese tsunami debris to the Greek islands and the arrival of asylum seekers and refugees to those same islands. Circulating throughout all of this is an account of her being unmoored by grief at the death of her parents. Each part of the triptych runs about 13 minutes; all three reward watching, start to finish.”
Ga will perform her work, The Fortunetellers, on Monday, July 22, at 7:00 pm. Visit the official page for more information.
Published: May 13, 2019
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