Lezley Saar

Lezley Saar (b. April 13, 1953) is a mixed-media artist and painter. Her artwork deals with themes of identity, race, gender, beauty, normalcy, and sanity. She has exhibited internationally, and nationally, and her work is included in museum collections such as The Kemper Museum, CAAM, The Ackland Art Museum, and MOCA. She is currently represented by Walter Maciel Gallery in Los Angeles.[1]

Lezley Saar
Born
Lezley Irene Saar

April 13, 1953
Los Angeles, CA
NationalityAmerican

Early life

Lezley Irene Saar was born in Los Angeles to artist parents. Her mother Betye Saar (née Brown), is an African-American assemblage artist and her father Richard Saar, was a ceramist and art restorer. She has two sisters, Alison and Tracye. When Saar was 18, she moved to Paris to attend the L'Institut Francais de Photographie.

While attending San Francisco State University, she worked at KPFA radio in Berkeley, and did illustrations for writers such as Ishmael Reed.[2] She received her B.A. from California State University at Northridge in 1978.

Artistic career

Saar began making altered books when she was pregnant with her first child in 1989.[3] She exhibited at the Jan Baum Gallery in Los Angeles and the David Beitzel Gallery in New York the 1990s.

Combining found objects, paint, and fabric, Saar’s work comments on themes of “hybridity, acceptance, and belonging.”[3] Saar’s work is narrative, often inspired by literature or historical figures. She stated, “I like the idea of a painting sucking you in like when you really get sucked in by a good book…I use that kind of metaphor as a vehicle for doing my art."[3]

Saar is the recipient of the California State Senate Contemporary Art Collection award (2000), the J. Paul Getty Mid-Career Grant (1996), and the Seagram’s Gin Perspective in African American Art Fellowship (1995).[1]

Exhibitions
  • 2018 "Betye, Alison, and Lezley Saar”, MOAH, Lancaster, CA
  • 2017 “Salon des Refusés”, California African American Museum, Los Angeles, CA[4]
  • 2017 “Gender Renaissance”, Walter Maciel Gallery, Los Angeles, CA
  • 2014 "Monad", Merry Karnowsky Gallery, Los Angeles, CA
  • 2012 “Madwoman in the Attic”, Merry Karnowsky Gallery, Los Angeles, CA
  • 2010. “Autist’s Fables”, Merry Karnowsky Gallery, Los Angeles, CA
  • 2007 “Tooth Hut”, Walter Maciel Gallery, Los Angeles, CA
  • 2007 “Family Legacies: The Art of Betye, Lezley & Alison Saar”, Palmer Art Museum, University Park, PA
  • 2007 “Family Legacies”, Pasadena Museum of California Art, Pasadena, CA and San Jose Museum of Art, San Jose, CA
  • 2005 “Family Legacies”, Ackland Art Museum, Chapel Hill, NC
  • 2004 “Recent Work,” Kravets/Wehby Gallery, New York, NY
  • 2004 “The Secret Self”, Sawhill Gallery, James Madison University, Harrisonburg, VA
  • 2003 "Mulatto Nation”, Jan Baum Gallery, Los Angeles, CA
  • 2003 “Mulatto Nation”, List Gallery, Swarthmore College, PA
  • 2003 “Africans, Rap Thugs-n-Dimes”, Forum for Contemporary Art, St. Louis, MO
  • 2003 “Encyclopedia Exotica”, David Beitzel Gallery, New York, NY
  • 2003 “Anomalies”, Kemper Museum of Contemporary Art, Kansas City, MO
  • 2000 “Paradox of the Unexpected Hanging”, Jan Baum Gallery, Los Angeles, CA
  • 2000 “Africans, Rap Thugs-n-Dimes”, The Contemporary Arts Center, Cincinnati, OH, traveled to the Saint Louis Museum, St. Louis, MO
  • 2000 “Africans, Tragic Mulattos, Anomalies and Rap” David Beitzel Gallery, NY
  • 2000 “Works by Alison and Leslie Saar”, Williamson Gallery, Scripps College, Claremont, CA
  • 1999 "Anomalies”, Fresno Museum of Art, Fresno, CA
  • 1997 New Work, David Beitzel Gallery, New York, NY
  • 1996 "Repetitive Ritual”, Jan Baum Gallery, Los Angeles, CA
  • 1994 "Recent Work”, Jan Baum Gallery, Los Angeles, CA
  • 1994 "The Athenaeum II," Mesa College, San Diego, CA
  • 1993 "The Athenaeum," Koplin Gallery, Santa Monica, CA
  • 1991 "Altar(ed) Books," Koplin Gallery, Santa Monica, CA
  • 1990 "Altered Books," Art Works, Los Angeles, CA

Publications
  • Brown, Betty Ann. Memory and Identity: The Marvelous Art of Betye Lezley and Alison Saar. Griffith Moon Press, 2018, ISBN 9780999845219
  • Dallow, Jessica. Family Legacies: The Art of Betye, Lezley, and Alison Saar. Chapel Hill: Ackland Art Museum, the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill in association with University of Washington Press, 2005, ISBN 029598564X
  • Saar, Lezley. Yolanda and the Strange Objects. I Reed Books, 1978, ISBN 978-0918408105
  • Saar, Lezley. Autist's Fables. 2010.
  • Taha, Halima. Collecting African American Art. Crown Publishers, 1998, ISBN 978-0517705933
  • Von Blum, Paul. Creative Souls: African American Artists in Greater Los Angeles. New World African Press, 2018, ISBN 9781945172052

References

[5] [6] [7] [8] [9] [10] [11]

  1. "Walter Maciel Gallery". Waltermacielgallery.com. Retrieved 3 November 2018.
  2. Reed, Ishmael (1995). Conversations with Ishmael Reed. University Press of Mississippi. ISBN 0878058141. OCLC 884122971.
  3. Rosenzweig, Leah (17 November 2017). "Rejected People Find a Home in the Otherworldly, Highly Personal Paintings of Lezley Saar". Laweekly.com. Retrieved 3 November 2018.
  4. "CAAM - Lezley Saar: Salon des Refusés". Caamuseum.org. Retrieved 3 November 2018.
  5. Kelley, Sonaiya. "Words and Pictures: In 'Salon des Refuses' mixed-media artist Lezley Saar explores gender and identity through surrealism and symbolism - Los Angeles Times". Latimes.com. Retrieved 3 November 2018.
  6. "Lezley Saar at California African American Museum (CAAM)". Artforum.com. Retrieved 3 November 2018.
  7. "Performing Identity: The Art of Lezley Saar Inspires Playful Proclamations of Selfhood - Ampersand". Ampersandla.com. 7 March 2018. Retrieved 3 November 2018.
  8. "LEZLEY SAAR – MADWOMAN IN THE ATTIC: THE FEMALE GOTHIC IN 19TH CENTURY LITERATURE". Artnet.com. Retrieved 3 November 2018.
  9. Villarreal, Ignacio. "Family Legacies: The Art of Betye, Lezley, and Alison Saar". Artdaily.com. Retrieved 3 November 2018.
  10. "Lezley Saar". Kcrw.com. Retrieved 3 November 2018.
  11. "Lezley Saar: Salon Des Refusés". Laweekly.com. Retrieved 3 November 2018.
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