Nari Ward facts for kids

Nari Ward (born 1963) is a Jamaican-American artist famous for his large sculptures and installations. He lives and works in New York City and is a professor at Hunter College.

Ward often creates his art using found objects, which are everyday items he finds in his neighborhood. Through his work, he explores big ideas about modern life, community, and culture. He has won many awards for his art, including the Vilcek Prize in 2017 and the Rome Prize in 2012.

Early Life and School

Nari Ward was born in St. Andrew, Jamaica, in 1963. When he was 12, his family moved to the United States. Even as a kid, he was a talented drawer. However, his parents worried about him becoming an artist because they thought artists were often poor and struggled in life.

At first, Ward studied advertising in college. But he soon realized his true passion was creating his own art. He earned a Bachelor of Arts degree from Hunter College in 1991 and a Master of Fine Arts degree from Brooklyn College in 1992. In 2011, he officially became a citizen of the United States.

Art Career

Nari Ward's art has been shown in museums and galleries all over the world. He has had his own solo shows and has also been part of group exhibitions with other artists.

His work was featured in the Whitney Biennial, a famous art show in New York, in both 1995 and 2006. He was also part of Documenta XI in Germany in 2003, which is another major international art event.

Some of the famous museums that have shown his art include:

• The Institute of Contemporary Art, Boston
• The New Museum of Contemporary Art in New York
• The Walker Art Center in Minneapolis
• The Pérez Art Museum Miami

One of his artworks, Homeland Sweet Homeland (2012), is part of the permanent collection at the Pérez Art Museum Miami. In 2015, the museum held a major exhibition of his work called Nari Ward: Sun Splashed. This show explored ideas about citizenship, identity, and moving to a new country.

In 2022, the Baltimore Museum of Art added his sculpture Peacekeeper to its collection.

Famous Art Installations

An installation is a type of art that is often large and fills up a whole room or space. Here are some of Nari Ward's most famous installations.

Amazing Grace, 1993

This powerful installation was first shown in an old firehouse in Harlem, New York. It was made of over 250 old baby strollers that Ward found in the neighborhood. He arranged them in the shape of a ship's hull.

Visitors walked around the strollers on a floor covered with flattened fire hoses. The room was dimly lit, and a recording of the gospel singer Mahalia Jackson singing "Amazing Grace" played over and over.

The song "Amazing Grace" was written by a man who had been involved in the slave trade. He wrote the song after surviving a storm at sea and changing his life. By using this song and arranging the strollers like a ship, Ward connected the artwork to history and ideas of hope and change.

Hunger Cradle, 1996

For this piece, Ward worked with two other artists in another old firehouse in Harlem. He created a giant, tangled web of ropes, wires, and yarn that stretched across an entire floor.

Caught in the web were different objects he found in the building, like a crib, books, and piano keys. The artwork looked like a huge, messy spider-web filled with trapped memories and objects from the past.

Mango Tourist, 2011

Mango Tourist is a fun and surprising artwork. It features several 10-foot-tall snowmen. But these aren't made of snow! Ward built them from yellow foam, old electronic parts, and mango seeds.

The artwork plays with people's expectations. Snowmen make you think of cold places, while mangoes grow in warm places like Ward's home country of Jamaica. Ward said he liked "messing with expectations" and challenging the label of being just "the artist from Jamaica," since he has lived in New York for most of his life.

Breathing Directions, 2015

This installation explores important themes from African-American history. Ward created patterns on the walls and floor inspired by symbols he saw at the First African Baptist Church in Savannah, Georgia.

This church was a stop on the Underground Railroad, a secret network that helped enslaved people escape to freedom. The church floor had holes drilled in it in a special pattern. These holes allowed the people hiding underneath the floor to breathe. Ward was inspired by how this history was hidden in plain sight. The artwork reminds us of the importance of breath and life.

Nari Ward: We The People, 2019

This was a major traveling exhibition that brought together many of Ward's most famous artworks from his career. It included pieces like Amazing Grace and Hunger Cradle.

The title piece, We the People (2011), is made of thousands of shoelaces that spell out the first three words of the U.S. Constitution. The exhibition helped people see how Ward's art consistently explores the experiences of Black people in America.

Awards and Recognition

Nari Ward has received many honors for his creative work. Some of his awards include:

• The Willard L. Metcalf Award from the American Academy of Arts and Letters (1998)
• A grant from the Pollock Krasner Foundation (1996)
• A grant from The National Endowment for the Arts (1994)
• A fellowship from the John Simon Guggenheim Foundation (1992)
• The Great Immigrants Award from The Carnegie Corporation of New York (2019)

He has also been an artist-in-residence at the famous Studio Museum in Harlem. His work has been commissioned by important groups like the United Nations and the World Health Organization.