Liz Larner facts for kids

Liz Larner (born in 1960) is an American artist who creates amazing sculptures and art installations. She lives and works in Los Angeles, California.

About Liz Larner

Liz Larner was born in Sacramento, California in 1960. She went to the California Institute of Arts in Valencia, California. In 1985, she earned her Bachelor of Fine Arts degree there. She also studied with a famous artist named John Baldessari.

Her Art and Sculptures

Liz Larner's artwork is often compared to sculptures made in the late 1960s and early 1970s. Artists like Eva Hesse and Jackie Winsor created similar kinds of art.

Materials Liz Larner Uses

In the late 1990s, Liz Larner started using ceramic materials in her art. She uses many different things to make her art. These include fiberglass, crystals, paper, clay, aluminum, steel, rubber, epoxy, mirrors, and cloth. She even used bacteria and her own saliva in some early works from the 1980s.

Exploring Space and Perception

Larner's sculptures are usually human-sized. They show her unique way of seeing things. She often tells a personal story through her art.

In her early art, Larner looked at how things change and break down. She made art using petri dish cultures and took photos of them. Later, her art installations and sculptures explored how an object fills a space. They also show how an object can change the way a person sees that space.

For example, her piece Damage Control (1987) is a two-foot-square block. It contains different substances. Another work, Used to Do the Job (1987), has two rough blocks stacked up. The bottom one is made of lead, and the top one is mostly wax.

Creating Illusions in 3D

In 1991, Larner had an idea for a sculpture. It was based on a visual trick called chromostereopsis. This is when colors, like red and green, seem to vibrate or create depth in a flat picture.

Her sculpture, called Corridor Red/Green, tries to bring this illusion into a 3D space. She uses different types of tension in the piece. There are bags on the ground holding green cloth. Metal creates the shape of red leather. Larner wanted to see if she could make that same feeling of vibration or excitement in three dimensions.

Sculptures That Seem to Move

Another sculpture is 2001, made in that year. It's a large, green-and-purple form, 12 feet wide. Larner mixed a cube and a sphere together in this piece. This makes the object look like it's always moving. Its surface is shiny, like the paint on a car.

In 2013, the Nasher Sculpture Center asked Larner to create a new sculpture. It was for The University of Texas at Dallas. Larner designed a sculpture called X. It's made of shiny stainless steel. This sculpture was placed in the courtyard of the new Edith O'Donnell Arts and Technology Building.

Art Shows and Exhibitions

Liz Larner's art has been shown in many exhibitions. These shows have been all over Europe and the United States.

Major Exhibitions

Big shows of her work have been held at:

• The Kunsthaus Graz in Austria (2006)
• The Museum of Contemporary Art, Los Angeles (2001)
• The Museum of Applied Arts in Vienna (1998)
• The Kunsthalle Basel in Basel (1997)

Her art was also part of the 2006 Whitney Biennial. It was also in "Helter Skelter: L.A. Art in the 1990s" in 1992. This show was at the Los Angeles Museum of Contemporary Art.

In 2006, Larner's sculpture 2001 was put on display. It was at the Doris C. Freedman Plaza near Central Park in New York City. The Public Art Fund organized this.

Recent Exhibitions

In 2013, Liz Larner created two versions of her "X" sculpture. These were for the Edith O'Donnell Arts and Technology Building in Texas.

In 2016, the Aspen Art Museum (AAM) had a special show of Larner's ceramic art. It featured her work from 2011 onwards.

In May 2019, Regen Projects hosted Larner's solo exhibition, "As Below, So Above."

Liz Larner is represented by Regen Projects in Los Angeles. She is also represented by the Tanya Bonakdar Gallery in New York City.

Where Her Art Is Kept

Liz Larner's artwork is part of many important art collections. Some of these include:

• The Los Angeles County Museum of Art
• The San Francisco Museum of Modern Art
• The Museum of Contemporary Art, Chicago
• The Museum of Contemporary Art, San Diego
• The Hammer Museum in Los Angeles
• The Museum of Contemporary Art, Los Angeles
• The Whitney Museum of American Art in New York
• The Stedelijk Museum in Amsterdam
• The Smithsonian Museum in Washington, DC

She also has a collection at the DESTE Foundation in Athens, Greece.

Awards and Recognition

Liz Larner has received several awards for her artistic achievements:

• In 1999, she won a Guggenheim Fellowship.
• In 2000, she received the Anonymous Was a Woman Award.
• In 2002, she was given the Lucelia Artist Award from the Smithsonian American Art Museum.
• In 2005, Liz Larner received the Pacific Design Center Stars of Design Award.
• In 2014, she received a grant from the Nancy Graves Foundation.