Lina Iris Viktor

Ep.231 Lina Iris Viktor is a Liberian- artist who lives and works in Italy. Influenced by architecture, archaeology, West African sculptural traditions, ancient Egyptian iconography, classical astronomy and European portraiture, her paintings, sculptures, performances, photography and water-gilding with 24-carat gold produce a charged materiality that address philosophical ideas of the finite and the infinite, the microcosm and macrocosm, evanescence and eternity. Her use of gold, marble, bronze, wood and volcanic rock establish an intimate and intangible timelessness whilst her focus on black as ‘materia prima’ challenges the sociopolitical and historical preconceptions surrounding ‘blackness’ and its universal implications. By interweaving disparate materials, methods and visual lexicons associated with contemporary and ancient art forms, Viktor authors an idiosyncratic mythology that threads through deep time, knitting together a diasporic past with an expansive present in order to divine future imaginaries. Viktor received her BA in film at Sarah Lawrence College and studied photography at The School of Visual Arts in New York. Solo exhibitions include Sir John Soane’s Museum, London (2024); Fotografiska Museum of Photography, Stockholm & Tallinn(2020); Autograph, London (2019); and New Orleans Museum of Art (2018), among others. Group exhibitions include the Museum of the African Diaspora [MoAD],San Francisco (2024); Hayward Gallery, London (2022); North Carolina Museum of Art, Raleigh (2020); Somerset House, London (2019); Ford Foundation, New York(2019) ); Ford Foundation, New York (2019); Crocker Art Museum, Sacramento (2018); Kentucky Museum of Art and Craft, Louisville (2016); Spelman Museum of Fine Art, Atlanta (2016); and Cooper Gallery, Harvard University, Cambridge (2016). Photo credit ©2024 Courtesy of LVXIX Atelier.   Sir John Soane Museum https://www.soane.org/exhibitions/lina-iris-viktor-mythic-time-tens-thousands-rememberings Museum of the African Diaspora (MoAD https://www.moadsf.org/exhibitions/liberatory-living Pilar Corrias https://www.pilarcorrias.com/exhibitions/419-lina-iris-viktor-solar-angels-lunar-lords/ Hayward Gallery https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Z1ZHUFirMRM&ab_channel=SouthbankCentre New Orleans Museum of Art https://noma.org/exhibitions/lina-iris-viktor-a-haven-a-hell-a-dream-deferred/ Fotografiska Stockholm https://stockholm.fotografiska.com/en/exhibitions/lina-iris-viktor Autograph https://autograph.org.uk/online-image-galleries/lina-iris-viktor-some-are-born-to-endless-night-dark-matter-exhibition-highlights Elephant https://elephant.art/lina-iris-viktors-distinct-mythology-a-photo-diary-from-the-artists-home-on-the-amalfi-coast/ Apollo Magazine https://www.apollo-magazine.com/lina-iris-viktor-soane-museum-review/ An Other https://www.anothermag.com/art-photography/15758/lina-iris-viktor-interview-mythic-time-sir-john-soane-museum-exhibition Artnet https://news.artnet.com/art-world/lina-iris-viktor-2379189 British Vogue https://www.vogue.co.uk/gallery/lina-iris-viktor-sir-john-soane Something Curated https://somethingcurated.com/2023/03/21/interview-lina-iris-viktor-on-the-libyan-sibyl-beauty-as-a-tool-for-truth/ The Art Newspaper https://www.theartnewspaper.com/2022/08/03/a-brush-with-lina-iris-viktor New York Times https://www.nytimes.com/2022/08/04/arts/design/in-the-black-fantastic-london.html