b.1969 in Honolulu. Lives and works in Los Angeles, CA.
Morris’s dynamic paintings contain formal tensions and contradictions through their embrace of patterns and textures, and the visibility of the artist’s hand in every gesture. Her work pushes against the historical foundation of her chosen medium and offers a glimpse into new ways forward for the constantly evolving and expanded field of painting. Having developed an extensive arsenal of techniques in her works on paper, which are a stand-alone part of her practice, Morris recombines them in her ambitious large-scale canvases. Morris inventively addresses questions of frame dynamics – frames within the bounds of the canvas, for instance, be they open-ended or closed off, square or circular – and figure/ground illusions, often evinced within a remarkably shallow pictorial space. The way that reflective surfaces resist a matte color, like oil and water, may set the circumstance for two intersecting fields, overlayed and forced to be read simultaneously.
Rebecca Morris has been the subject of multiple solo and significant group exhibitions including museum presentations in the Whitney Biennial, New York (2014), and Made in L.A., Hammer Museum, Los Angeles (2016) as well as the Wexner Center for the Arts (2018). Morris had major solo exhibitions at the Bonnefanten Museum, Maastricht, Holland (2014) and the Blaffer Museum of Art, Houston (2019), and a 21-year travelling survey exhibition of Morris’ work was presented at The Institute of Contemporary Art LA (2022) and the Museum of Contemporary Art Chicago (2023). Other recent solo shows include LA><ART (2014), 356 Mission Rd, (2015), and #31 at Bortolami Gallery in New York (2023).
Rebecca Morris and Jamillah James in conversation at ICA Los Angeles (YouTube)
Artist Talk: Rebecca Morris at Blaffer Art Museum (YouTube)