Isaac Julien
Isaac Julien
Isaac Julien
Isaac Julien
Isaac Julien
Isaac Julien
Isaac Julien
Isaac Julien
Isaac Julien
Isaac Julien
Isaac Julien
Isaac Julien
Isaac Julien
Isaac Julien
Isaac Julien
Isaac Julien
Isaac Julien
Isaac Julien
Isaac Julien
Isaac Julien
Isaac Julien
Isaac Julien is as acclaimed for his fluent, arresting films as for his vibrant and inventive gallery installations. One of the objectives of his work is to break down the barriers that exist between different artistic disciplines, drawing from and commenting on film, dance, photography, music, theatre, painting and sculpture, and uniting them to construct a powerfully visual narrative.
Julien came to prominence in the film world with his 1989 drama-documentary Looking for Langston, gaining a cult following with this poetic exploration of Langston Hughes and the Harlem Renaissance. During the past three decades he has made work largely, though not exclusively, for galleries and museums, using multi-screen installations to express fractured narratives exploring memory and desire. Julien’s major film installations include the seven-screen PLAYTIME (2014), which explores the dramatic and nuanced subject of financial capital. Starring an international roster of actors including Maggie Cheung, Mercedes Cabral and James Franco, PLAYTIME comprises three chapters set across three cities defined by their relationship to capital: London, a city transformed by the deregulation of banks; Reykjavik, where the 2008 crisis began; and Dubai, one of the Middle East's burgeoning financial markets. Part documentary and part fiction, the work interconnects major figures in the world of art and finance with the real stories of those deeply affected by the crisis and the global flow of capital.
Julien’s critically acclaimed nine-screen film installation Ten Thousand Waves, 2010, explores China's ancient past and rapidly transforming present through a series of interlocking narratives. Starring, among others, Maggie Cheung, the legendary siren of Chinese cinema, and filmed on location in the ravishing and remote Guangxi province and at the famous Shanghai Film Studios and various sites around Shanghai, TEN THOUSAND WAVES combines fact, fiction, and film essay genres against a background of Chinese history, legend, and landscape to create a meditation on global human migrations. Through formal experimentation and a series of unique collaborations, Julien seeks to engage with Chinese culture through contemporary events, ancient myths, and artistic practice. The original inspiration for TEN THOUSAND WAVES was the Morecambe Bay tragedy of 2004, in which 23 Chinese cockle-pickers died. In response to this event, Julien commissioned the poet Wang Ping to come to England and write Small Boats, a poem that is recited in the work. In the successive years, Julien has spent time in China slowly coming to understand the country and its people's perspectives and developing the relationships that have enabled him to undertake this rich and multifaceted work.
Earlier audio-visual installations range from Baltimore (2003), which, in part through the stylisations of black action movies from the 1970s, looks at the histories, divisions and intersections of black and white cultures, through to his trilogy comprising True North (2004), Fantôme Afrique (2005) and Western Union: Small Boats (2007), all of which deal with themes of voyaging and cultural displacement on both a local and global scale.
In 2015 Julien directed a series of readings and performances as a pivotal component of the exhibition 'All the World's Futures', curated by Okwui Enwezor as Artistic Director of the 56th Venice Biennale; the cornerstone of this programme was a continuous live reading of all three volumes of Karl Marx's Das Kapital throughout the exhibition's seven-month duration. Other significant projects by the artist include the devising and curation of a very personal selection of work by the late artist and filmmaker Derek Jarman (2008); he has also worked in collaboration with choreographer Russell Maliphant to create the multimedia dance event Cast No Shadow (2007).
In 2019, the world premiere of Julien’s Lessons of the Hour – Frederick Douglass took place at Memorial Art Gallery, University of Rochester. The work is a meditation on the life, words, and actions of Frederick Douglass (1818–1895), the visionary African American abolitionist and freed slave, and on the issues of social justice that shaped his life’s work.
The nine-screen installation Lina Bo Bardi - A Marvellous Entanglement premiered at Victoria Miro in 2019. Reflecting on the iconic work and on the legacy of the visionary modernist architect and designer (1914–1992), it traverses a collection of Lina Bo Bardi’s most iconic buildings, featuring artists and personal acquaintances of Bo Bardi’s, such as actor, director, playwright and co-founder of São Paulo’s Teatro Oficina, José Celso Martinez Corrêa (known as Zé Celso). Starring the acclaimed Brazilian actresses Fernanda Montenegro and her daughter Fernanda Torres, A Marvellous Entanglement portrays Bo Bardi at different stages of her life, as Montenegro and Torres recite texts closely adapted from the architect’s writings.
Once Again . . . (Statues Never Die), 2022, commissioned by the Barnes Foundation in celebration of its centennial, is an immersive five-screen installation exploring the relationship between Dr. Albert C. Barnes, who was an early US collector and exhibitor of African material culture, and the famed philosopher and cultural critic Alain Locke, known as the 'Father of the Harlem Renaissance.' Once Again . . . (Statues Never Die) looks at Dr. Barnes’s and Alain Locke’s storied relationship, its mutually formative critical dialogue, and its significant impact on their work as cultural critics, educators, organisers, and activists on behalf of various African American causes. The work premiered at the Barnes Foundation in 2022 (on view 19 June–4 September 2022).
In 2023, Julien’s major solo presentation, Isaac Julien: What Freedom Is To Me, premiered at Tate Britain, London, revealing the scope of Julien’s pioneering work in film and installation from the early 1980s through to the present day (26 April–20 August 2023); touring to K21, Düsseldorf, Germany (23 September 2023–14 January 2024), and Bonnefanten Museum, Maastricht, Netherlands (8 March 2024–18 August 2024).
About the artist
Born in 1960, Isaac Julien lives and works in London and Santa Cruz, California. He has been making films and producing film installations for over forty years, including Once Again… (Statues Never Die) (2022), Lina Bo Bardi – A Marvellous Entanglement (2019), Lessons of the Hour – Frederick Douglass (2019), Stones Against Diamonds (2015), PLAYTIME (2014), Ten Thousand Waves (2010), Western Union: Small Boats (2007), Fantôme Afrique (2005), True North (2004), Baltimore (2003), Paradise Omeros (2002), Vagabondia (2000), and The Long Road to Mazatlan (1999).
Recent international solo and group exhibitions include: Isaac Julien: Lessons of the Hour, MoMA, New York, USA; Isaac Julien: Once Again...(Statues Never Die), Whitney Biennale, Whitney Museum of American Art, USA; Isaac Julien: Ten Thousand Waves, Espace Louis Vuitton Osaka, Japan; Entangled Pasts, 1768–now, Royal Academy, London, UK; Isaac Julien: Lessons of the Hour - Frederick Douglass, Tang Teaching Museum, New York, USA; A Model, Mudam – The Contemporary Art Museum of Luxembourg; Soulscapes, Dulwich Picture Gallery, London, UK (2024); Isaac Julien: What Freedom Is To Me, Tate Britain, London, UK; touring to K21, Germany; Bonnefanten Museum, Maastricht, Netherlands (2023-2024); Isaac Julien: Lessons of the Hour - Frederick Douglass, National Portrait Gallery and Smithsonian American Art Museum, Washington, D.C. USA; Isaac Julien: Lessons of the Hour - Frederick Douglass, Jordan Schnitzer Museum of Art, Oregon, USA; I Am Seen…Therefore, I Am: Isaac Julien and Frederick Douglass, Wadsworth Atheneum Museum of Art, Connecticut, USA; Isaac Julien: PLAYTIME, PalaisPopulaire, Germany; Isaac Julien: Lina Bo Bardi – A Marvellous Entanglement, Philadelphia Museum of Art, Philadelphia, USA; Isaac Julien: Lina Bo Bardi – A Marvellous Entanglement, Yale School of Architecture, Connecticut, USA (2023); Isaac Julien: Once Again… (Statues Never Die), Barnes Foundation, Philadelphia, USA; Isaac Julien: Lessons of the Hour - Frederick Douglass, Virginia Museum of Fine Arts, USA; Isaac Julien, Goslar Kaiserring, Mönchehaus Museum, Goslar, Germany; Details of Regeneration: Black Cinema 1898 – 1971, Academy Museum, Los Angeles, USA; Life Between Islands: Caribbean-British Art 1950s-Now, Tate Britain, London, UK, touring to the Art Gallery of Ontario, Toronto, Canada (2022-2023); Isaac Julien: Lessons of the Hour, Smith College Museum of Art, Northampton, USA; Isaac Julien: Lessons of the Hour, McEvoy Foundation for the Arts, San Francisco, USA (2021); Isaac Julien: Lina Bo Bardi – A Marvellous Entanglement, MAXXI, Rome, Italy (2020) touring to Bechtler Museum of Modern Art, Charlotte NC, USA; Galeria Helga de Alvear, Madrid, Spain; Roslyn Oxley9 Gallery, Sydney, Australia (2021-2022); Isaac Julien: Western Union: Small Boats, Neuberger Museum, New York; Masculinities: Liberation through Photography, Barbican Art Gallery, London, UK, travelling to Martin-Gropius-Bau, Berlin, among others (2020); Baltimore at the Baltimore Museum of Art (2019-2020); Isaac Julien: Frederick Douglass: Lessons of the Hour, SCAD Museum of Art, Savannah, USA (2019); Looking for Langston, Tate Britain, London, UK (2019); PLAYTIME at LACMA, Los Angeles, USA (2019); Black Refractions: Highlights from the Studio Museum in Harlem, Gibbes Museum, Charleston, USA (2019). Also in 2019, Julien’s PLAYTIME was featured as part of Ruby City's inaugural programme, Texas, USA.
Previously, Julien has had solo exhibitions at venues including ARoS Aarhus Kunstmuseum, Denmark (2018); The Whitworth, Manchester (2018); The Royal Ontario Museum, Toronto (2017); MAC Niterói, Rio de Janeiro, Brazil (2016), MUAC (Museo Universitario Arte Contemporáneo), Mexico City (2016); the De Pont Museum, Netherlands (2015); Museum of Modern Art, New York (2013), Art Institute of Chicago (2013), Museum of Contemporary Art, San Diego (2012), Nasjonalmuseet, Oslo (2012), Bass Museum, Miami, Florida, USA (2010), Museum Brandhorst, Munich (2009), Museu Nacional de Arte Contemporânea - Museu do Chiado, Lisbon, Portugal (2008), Kestnergesellschaft Hanover (2006), Pompidou Centre Paris (2005), and MoCA Miami (2005).
In 2023, Julien was ranked fifth in the Art Review ‘Power 100’ list.
In 2022, Julien received a Knighthood in the Queen’s Birthday Honours for the Platinum Jubilee year and was honoured with the esteemed Kaiserring Goslar Award.
In 2019, Julien was appointed to the faculty of the University of California, Santa Cruz. Julien and independent curator and writer Mark Nash, the former head of contemporary art at the Royal College of Art in London, developed the Isaac Julien Lab at the UC Santa Cruz campus, which provides students with the opportunity to assist Julien and Nash with project research and the production of moving image and photographic works in California and London.
In 2017, Julien was appointed a Commander of the Order of the British Empire (CBE) for services to the Arts in the Queen’s Birthday Honours List and was the recipient of The Royal Academy of Arts Charles Wollaston Award.
International Programme
Survey: Selected Works
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Tecnologia pré-histórica / Prehistoric Technology (Lina Bo Bardi - A Marvellous Entanglement), 2019
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O que é um museu? / What is a Museum? (Lina Bo Bardi - A Marvellous Entanglement), 2019
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Soluções inventadas / Solutions Invented (Lina Bo Bardi - A Marvellous Entanglement), 2019
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Pas de deux with Roses (Looking for Langston Vintage Series), 1989/2016
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Film-Noir Staircase (Looking for Langston Vintage Series), 1989/2016
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After George Platt Lynes (Looking for Langston Vintage Series), 1989/2017
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PLAYTIME, 2014
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ECLIPSE (Playtime), 2013
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MIRAGE (Playtime), 2013
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Ten Thousand Waves, 2010
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Still Life Studies Series, No. 1, 2008
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Derek Jarman Brutal Beauty, 2008
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True North Series, Ice Project Work No. 8, 2007
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True South Series No 4 (Apparatus 4 / Mis-en-Scene), 2008
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Western Union Series No. 2 (Flight Towards Other Destinies 1), 2007
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Western Union Series No. 7 (The Leopard), 2007
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Western Union: Small Boats, 2007
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Western Union: Small Boats, 2007
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Fantôme Créole, 2005
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Fantôme Créole Series (Place des Cineastes - Roundabout), 2005
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Fantôme Créole Series (Cinema Cinema), 2005
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Baltimore, 2003
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Baltimore Series (Angela in Blue, No.1), 2003
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Vagabondia, 2000
Related
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Review Posted July 12 2024
Alex Greenberger reviews Isaac Julien installations at MoMA and the Whitney Museum, on view in New York
'In all three, he takes up storied figures of Black history, resisting history lessons and clichés in the process.' Alex Greenberger, Art in America -
Review Posted June 13 2024
Artforum commends Isaac Julien in its review of the Whitney Biennial
‘In one of the Biennial’s standout works, Once Again . . . (Statues Never Die), 2022, Julien seems keenly aware that any encounter with the historical past is invariably a double-sided affair, with the present inevitably reinterpreting the past as much as the past might seek to guide the present.’ – Andrew V. Uroskie Andrew V. Uroskie, Artforum -
Talk Posted June 11 2024
Sherrilyn Ifill and Isaac Julien on the Legacy of Frederick Douglass at MoMA
Taking place at 6–7.30pm (ET) on Wednesday 12 June 2024, a special conversation on Douglass’ continuing relevance, with artist Sir Isaac Julien and civil rights leader Sherrilyn Ifill. The Museum of Modern Art, New York -
Exhibition Posted May 16 2024
On view at MoMA – Isaac Julien: Lessons of the Hour
On view 19 May–28 September 2024 (member previews 17, 18 May), Isaac Julien’s immersive portrait of abolitionist Frederick Douglass, who obtained freedom from chattel slavery in 1838 and became one of the most important orators, writers, and statespersons of the nineteenth century. MoMA, New York -
Exhibition Posted March 26 2024
Isaac Julien: Ten Thousand Waves at Espace Louis Vuitton Osaka
On view 27 March–22 September 2024, Isaac Julien's monumental 2010 video installation stages a polyphony of actors, places and periods in a tribute to Chinese culture. Osaka, Japan -
Talk Posted March 19 2024
Annual Stuart Hall Public Conversation with Isaac Julien
Taking place 2–5pm on 23 March 2024, Julien’s keynote presentation will focus on the current state of the imaginary, exploring the connection between image-making and political allegory. Conway Hall, London -
Exhibition Posted March 11 2024
Whitney Biennial 2024, featuring Isaac Julien
Reviewing the exhibition in the New York Times, Martha Schwendener writes, ‘Isaac Julien’s masterful video and sculpture installation is a highlight of the show. It remakes the dialogue between the Harlem Renaissance philosopher Alain Locke and the collector-philanthropist Albert C. Barnes, and there is an absorbing discussion of how Europeans and Americans viewed African sculpture — and the responses of Black versus white artists and collectors to such objects. Whitney Museum of American Art, New York -
Exhibition Posted March 9 2024
On view at The Bonnefanten, Maastricht – Isaac Julien: What Freedom Is To Me
Travelling from Tate Britain, London, and K21 Düsseldorf, this major survey (9 March–18 August 2024) reveals the breadth of Isaac Julien's groundbreaking oeuvre from its emergence in the 1980s to the present. Bonnefanten, Maastricht -
Exhibition Posted February 14 2024
Soulscapes, featuring Njideka Akunyili Crosby and Isaac Julien, at Dulwich Picture Gallery
The exhibition (14 February–2 June 2024) explores our connection with the world around us, highlighting the power of landscape art and reflecting on themes of belonging, memory, joy and transformation. Dulwich Picture Gallery -
Exhibition Posted February 8 2024
Isaac Julien features in A Model at MUDAM
This major group exhibition (9 February–8 September 2024) proposes a reflection on the role of the museum at the beginning of the twenty-first century. It reaffirms the need to think of the institution as a living place, sensitive and receptive to contemporary debates. MUDAM, Luxembourg -
News story Posted January 31 2024
Whitechapel Gallery Art Icon 2024: Isaac Julien
On Monday 18 March 2024, Whitechapel Gallery hosted its annual Art Icon Gala in honour of Isaac Julien. Whitechapel Gallery, London -
Exhibition Posted January 25 2024
Isaac Julien features in Entangled Pasts, 1768–now at the Royal Academy of Arts
The exhibition (3 February–28 April 2024) brings together over 100 major contemporary and historic works as part of a conversation about art and its role in shaping narratives of empire, enslavement, resistance, abolition and colonialism – and how it may help set a course for the future. Royal Academy of Arts, London -
Exhibition Posted January 25 2024
As announced in The New York Times, Isaac Julien is featured in the 2024 Whitney Biennial
Opening on 20 March 2024 (member previews from 14 March) and titled Even Better Than the Real Thing, the Biennial includes 71 artists and collectives. -
Exhibition Posted January 18 2024
Isaac Julien: Lessons of the Hour – Frederick Douglass at Tang Museum
In this film installation (on view 3 February–19 May 2024) Julien conjures Douglass’s role in the abolitionist movement, powerfully emphasizing its relevance to contemporary social justice struggles. Saratoga Springs, NY -
News story Posted December 8 2023
Isaac Julien, Alice Neel and Chris Ofili feature in the Frieze top ten shows in the UK and Ireland in 2023
Sean Burns highlights exhibitions by Isaac Julien, Alice Neel and Chris Ofili from the past year. Sean Burns, Freize -
Exhibition Posted December 8 2023
On view at The Smithsonian – Isaac Julien: Lessons of the Hour – Frederick Douglass
Now on view (8 December 2023–6 December 2026), this is the first joint acquisition between the National Portrait Gallery and the Smithsonian American Art Museum, Washington DC. Washington, DC -
Just announced Posted December 1 2023
Isaac Julien features in the 2023 ArtReview Power 100
The artist is ranked number 5 in this year’s Power 100. ArtReview -
Talk Posted October 16 2023
Paris+ par Art Basel hosts an artist talk with Isaac Julien
Inaugurating the Conversations Paris+ par Art Basel programme, this first talk examines the oeuvre of artist and filmmaker Isaac Julien. Centre Pompidou -
Interview Posted October 11 2023
Isaac Julien speaks with Barry Jenkins as part of CHANEL Connects
Isaac Julien speaks with filmmaker Barry Jenkins for season three of the culture podcast, CHANEL Connects. CHANEL Connects -
Exhibition Posted September 23 2023
Isaac Julien: What Freedom Is To Me at K21, Düsseldorf
The first survey exhibition (23 September 2023–14 January 2024) in Germany dedicated to work of Isaac Julien reveals the breadth of a groundbreaking oeuvre from its emergence in the 1980s to the present. K21, Düsseldorf -
Exhibition Posted August 24 2023
On view at the Yale Architecture Gallery – Isaac Julien: Lina Bo Bardi – A Marvellous Entanglement
On view 24 August–10 December 2023, the nine-screen installation envisioned for the Yale Architecture Gallery and presented by the Yale Center for British Art ignites a conversation between Bo Bardi’s landmark buildings in Brazil and Paul Rudolph’s Brutalist design for the Yale School of Architecture (1963). New Haven, Connecticut -
Exhibition Posted May 19 2023
On view at Wadsworth Atheneum Museum of Art – I Am Seen… Therefore, I Am: Isaac Julien and Frederick Douglass
Isaac Julien’s immersive, multi-screen film installation Lessons of the Hour anchors this exploration of Frederick Douglass’ reflections on image-making, race, and citizenship. On view 18 May–24 September 2023. Wadsworth Atheneum Museum of Art , Hartford, Connecticut -
Gallery Exhibition 2 May - 4 June 2023
Isaac Julien: Once Again… (Statues Never Die) – Photographs
Isaac Julien’s latest work Once Again… (Statues Never Die) is the focus of this exhibition of newly conceived photographic works. Victoria Miro Gallery II -
Exhibition Posted April 26 2023
Isaac Julien: What Freedom Is To Me at Tate Britain
This ambitious solo exhibition (26 April–20 August 2023) reveals the scope of Julien’s pioneering work in film and installation from the early 1980s through to the present day. Tate Britain -
News story Posted April 25 2023
Acclaim for Isaac Julien: What Freedom Is To Me at Tate Britain
★★★★★ ‘In a career spanning 40 years, he has matched searing political conviction and intellectual heft to formal experiments in filmmaking.‘ – inews; ★★★★ ‘Julien is unafraid to be spectacular, lushly beautiful, even extravagant, but always with the sucker punch of his critical eye and political subject matter.‘ – Evening Standard -
Interview Posted March 22 2023
Isaac Julien features on the cover of April’s Frieze
Ahead of his major exhibition at Tate Britain, the artist considers how his films will exist in the future, in conversation with Deborah Willis. Frieze -
Exhibition Posted March 8 2023
Isaac Julien: Playtime – Works from the Wemhöner Collection, now open at the PalaisPopulaire
On view in Germany for the first time (8 March–10 July 2023), Playtime makes the real existence of capital tangible, also raising awareness of the individual, social, cultural, and ecological effects of capitalism. The PalaisPopulaire, Berlin -
Exhibition Posted February 7 2023
Now open – Sharjah Biennial 15, featuring work by Isaac Julien and Wangechi Mutu
Conceived by the late Okwui Enwezor and curated by Hoor Al Qasimi, Director of Sharjah Art Foundation, Sharjah Biennial 15: Thinking Historically in the Present (7 February–11 June 2023) reflects on Enwezor's visionary work, which transformed contemporary art and established an ambitious intellectual project that has influenced the evolution of institutions and biennials around the world. Sharjah, United Arab Emirates -
Exhibition Posted January 2 2023
Isaac Julien features in Regeneration: Black Cinema 1898–1971
On view until 16 July 2023, Isaac Julien's Baltimore is presented in conjunction with the exhibition Regeneration: Black Cinema 1898–1971. This three-channel installation pays homage to the late writer, director, producer, and actor Melvin Van Peebles. Academy Museum of Motion Pictures, Los Angeles -
Preview Posted December 27 2022
Isaac Julien, Alice Neel and Paula Rego feature in The Guardian’s 2023 culture preview
Isaac Julien, Alice Neel and Paula Rego feature in The Guardian’s art-design to-do list for the year ahead. The Guardian -
News story Posted December 15 2022
Isaac Julien features in Art Review’s Power 100
Julien’s ambitious film-installations and videos, which blend archive images with reenactments to offer constellationlike portraits of historic Black figures, have become cult references among artists seeking to engage with Black histories and the legacies of cultural domination, migration and the diasporic experience. Art Review -
Exhibition Posted December 15 2022
Isaac Julien: Lina Bo Bardi – A Marvellous Entanglement at Philadelphia Museum of Art
On view from 28 January–29 May 2023, Lina Bo Bardi – A Marvellous Entanglement, 2019, explores the life, work, and legacy of the Italian-Brazilian modernist architect Lina Bo Bardi (1914–1992). Philadelphia Museum of Art, Pennsylvania -
Exhibition Posted December 10 2022
Isaac Julien: Lessons of the Hour – Frederick Douglass at Virginia Museum of Fine Arts
On view 10 December 2022–9 July 2023, Lessons of the Hour – Frederick Douglass is an immersive and poetic meditation on the great 19th-century abolitionist. The poignant 10-screen film installation collapses time and space to bridge persistent historical and contemporary challenges of the day. Virginia Museum of Fine Arts, Richmond -
Interview Posted December 8 2022
Isaac Julien speaks to Whitewall about Once Again . . . (Statues Never Die)
‘What we’re trying to do in this work is to continue that trajectory of looking at texts from let’s say, a modernist period, like Césaire, writing about African objects, that first encounter of poets and writers from the diaspora responding. And thinking about that conversation now, which is a very different one.’ – Isaac Julien Katy Donoghue, Whitewall -
Exhibition Posted September 17 2022
Isaac Julien: Kaiserring der Stadt Goslar 2022 at Mönchehaus-Museum für moderne Kunst
The exhibition (8 October 2022–29 January 2023) features two important cinematic works: Looking for Langston, 1989, and Lessons of the Hour, 2019. Mönchehaus-Museum für moderne Kunst, Germany -
Review Posted August 11 2022
Once Again . . . (Statues Never Die) by Isaac Julien is reviewed The New Yorker
Julian Lucas for The New Yorker reviews Isaac Julien's new film Once Again . . . (Statues Never Die). Julian Lucas, The New Yorker -
Interview Posted August 5 2022
Isaac Julien speaks to The New York Times about Once Again... (Statues Never Die)
Isaac Julien is interviewed by The New York Times about the artist's new film Once Again... (Statues Never Die), currently on view at the Barnes Foundation until 4 September 2022. Arthur Lubow, The New York Times -
Feature Posted July 29 2022
Vogue features Isaac Julien’s Once Again... (Statues Never Die) at the Barnes Foundation
At the Barnes Foundation, Isaac Julien Stages a Soaring Ode to Black Creativity Robert Sullivan, Vogue -
Exhibition Posted June 20 2022
Royal Academy Summer Exhibition 2022
This year's theme, chosen by exhibition coordinator Alison Wilding, is ‘Climate’, with rooms selected by Grayson Perry and Conrad Shawcross. Featuring works by Perry, Shawcross, Isaac Julien, and Tal R. Royal Academy of Arts, London -
Exhibition Posted June 14 2022
Isaac Julien: Once Again... (Statues Never Die) at the Barnes Foundation
In celebration of the Barnes centennial, the museum has commissioned Once Again . . . (Statues Never Die), an immersive five-screen installation by artist and filmmaker Sir Isaac Julien, on view from 19 June 2022. The Barnes Foundation, Philadelphia -
News story Posted June 6 2022
Isaac Julien receives a knighthood in the Queen’s Birthday Honours
Congratulations to Isaac Julien on receiving a knighthood in the Queen's Birthday Honours for the Platinum Jubilee year. -
Exhibition Posted May 28 2022
Isaac Julien: Looking for Langston at Inhotim, Brazil
Julien’s seminal 1989 work is on view (from 28 May 2022) at Inhotim in Brumadinho, Brazil. Blending poetry and images, Julien draws on a lyrical exploration of the private world of Langston Hughes and the fellow Black artists and writers who shaped the Harlem Renaissance. Brumadinho, Brazil -
Exhibition Posted March 4 2022
Works by Isaac Julien go on view at Samstag Museum of Art, Adelaide
On view 4 March–27 May 2022, the Australian premiere of A Marvellous Entanglement, 2019, which pays tribute to the signficant Brazilian modernist architect Lina Bo Bardi, and Ten Thousand Waves, 2010, a poetically evocative weaving together of stories drawn from China's ancient past and the present. Samstag Museum of Art, Adelaide -
News Posted February 2 2022
Isaac Julien receives the Goslar Kaiserring 2022
Isaac Julien has received the Goslar Kaiserring Award 2022 for his breaking down the barriers between different artistic disciplines by drawing from film, dance, photography, music, theatre, painting and sculpture and uniting them in a highly sensual visual narrative. -
Review Posted December 13 2021
The Brooklyn Rail on Isaac Julien: Lina Bo Bardi — A Marvellous Entanglement
Osman Can Yerebakan for The Brooklyn Rail reviews Isaac Julien: Lina Bo Bardi — A Marvellous Entanglement. Osman Can Yerebakan, The Brooklyn Rail -
Review Posted December 5 2021
The Observer gives ★★★★★ for Life Between Islands: Caribbean-British Art 1950s
The new Tate Britain exhibition is positively reviewed by Laura Cumming for The Observer. Laura Cumming, The Observer -
Exhibition Posted November 30 2021
Works by Njideka Akunyili Crosby, Isaac Julien and Chris Ofili are featured in Life Between Islands at Tate Britain
This landmark group exhibition (1 December 2021–3 April 2022) explores the work of artists from the Caribbean who made their home in Britain, alongside other artists whose work has been influenced and inspired by Caribbean themes and heritage. Tate Britain -
Exhibition Posted November 7 2021
Works by Isaac Julien feature in the LACMA exhibition Black American Portraits
Spanning over two centuries from c.1800 to the present day, this selection (on view 7 November 2021–17 April 2022) of approximately 150 works draws primarily from LACMA's permanent collection and highlights emancipation and early studio photography. Los Angeles County Museum of Art, California -
Exhibition Posted October 30 2021
Isaac Julien: Lina Bo Bardi – A Marvellous Entanglement opens at The Bechtler Museum of Modern Art
The first US museum presentation of Lina Bo Bardi - A Marvellous Entanglement, Isaac Julien’s nine-screen film installation, which is tribute to the visionary Italian-Brazilian architect Lina Bo Bardi. On view 30 October 2021–27 February 2022. The Bechtler Museum of Modern Art, Charlotte, North Carolina -
Exhibition Posted September 22 2021
The RA Summer Exhibition 2021 featuring work by Njideka Akunyili Crosby, Chantal Joffe, Isaac Julien, Grayson Perry, Howardena Pindell and Conrad Shawcross
Opening on 22 September 2021–2 January 2022, this year's exhibition includes work by Njideka Akunyili Crosby, Chantal Joffe, Isaac Julien, Grayson Perry, Howardena Pindell and Conrad Shawcross. Royal Academy of Arts -
Exhibition Posted July 29 2021
The UK and European premiere of Isaac Julien’s Lessons of the Hour
This ten-screen film installation (on view at Modern One from 29 July–10 October 2021) offers a poetic meditation on the life and times of Frederick Douglass, the visionary African American writer, abolitionist, and a freed slave, who spent two years in Edinburgh in the 1840s campaigning across Scotland, England, and Ireland for freedom and social justice. Modern One, Edinburgh -
Exhibition Posted July 21 2021
Isaac Julien features in the Royal Academy’s Piccadilly Art Takeover
As Isaac Julien prepares for the UK premiere of his ten-screen film installation, Lessons of the Hour, a highlight of the Edinburgh Art Festival 2021, London audiences will enjoy a single-screen adaptation of the film. Video shorts will be shown regularly, culminating in a 30-minute presentation. Piccadilly Circus, London -
Exhibition Posted June 25 2021
Masculinities: Liberation through Photography, featuring Isaac Julien, tours to LUMA, Arles
This major exhibition (4 July–26 September 2021), which originated at The Barbican, considers how masculinity has been coded, performed, and socially constructed from the 1960s to the present day. LUMA, Arles, France -
Gallery Exhibition 24 February - 30 April 2021
The Sky was Blue the Sea was Blue and the Boy was Blue
An exhibition of work by 19 artists celebrating the colour blue, available online and on Vortic as part of The London Collective. Victoria Miro on Vortic -
News story Posted January 7 2021
Isaac Julien judges Wallpaper* Design Awards 2021
Isaac Julien announced as a judge for the Wallpaper* Design Awards 2021. TF Chan, Wallpaper* -
Gallery Exhibition Posted September 23 2020
Isaac Julien: Lina Bo Bardi – A Marvellous Entanglement opens at MAXXI, Rome
Isaac Julien: Lina Bo Bardi – A Marvellous Entanglement opens at MAXXI – National Museum of 21st Century Art. Rome -
Interview Posted July 22 2020
Isaac Julien talks to The New York Times
Isaac Julien is one of four artists who talk about how they’ve been spending quarantine and just where, in this era of never-ending screen time, their work should live. Andrew Russeth, The New York Times -
Exhibition Posted July 13 2020
Reopen and extended – Isaac Julien features in Masculinities: Liberation through Photography at the Barbican
This major exhibition (now extended to 23 August 2020) considers how masculinity has been coded, performed, and socially constructed from the 1960s to the present day. Barbican Art Gallery, London -
Public Art Posted April 4 2020
A new mural by Isaac Julien goes on view in La Jolla, California
La Jolla, California, has just welcomed a newly installed public work by Isaac Julien. Julien’s mural, ECLIPSE (PLAYTIME), is a still from the artist's 2013 film Playtime in which he explores and critiques how the flow of financial capital controls the contemporary art world. La Jolla, California -
Exhibition Posted February 16 2020
Isaac Julien and Do Ho Suh feature in When Home Won’t Let You Stay: Migration through Contemporary Art opening at Minneapolis Institute of Art
The exhibition (23 February–24 May 2020) considers how contemporary artists are responding to the migration, immigration, and displacement of peoples today. Minneapolis Institute of Art, Minnesota