Sienna Shields facts for kids

Sienna Shields (born in 1976) is an American artist. She creates amazing abstract artworks. She is known for her large collage pieces.

Shields also helped start and lead an artist group called the Yams Collective. She directed their digital film, Good Stock on the Dimension Floor: An Opera. This film was chosen for the 2014 Whitney Biennial, a big art show.

Early Life and Education

Sienna Shields was born in Alaska in 1976. Her parents were both teachers. For a time, she and her two siblings were home-schooled. This was when they lived outside Anchorage.

In 1998, she finished college at Lewis & Clark College in Portland, Oregon. She earned a degree in Caribbean and Latin American history. Later, in 2001, she moved to a shared living space for artists in Brooklyn, New York.

Artistic Style and Techniques

Shields's art style is shaped by the lively energy of the artist groups she lived with. Many of her artworks are collages. She uses acrylic paint and many layers of cut or torn paper. She puts these together to make large, abstract pieces.

She started working this way after college. It was partly because art supplies were expensive. Besides collages, she also makes bead sculptures. She uses different materials in her art, which is called mixed media. She also creates digital images.

The 2014 Whitney Biennial and the Yams Collective

The Whitney Biennial is a famous art show. Only invited artists can display their work there. It often helps young artists become more well-known. Famous artists like Georgia O'Keeffe and Jackson Pollock gained fame from it.

The Biennial has sometimes been criticized. People have said it doesn't always include a wide range of artists. Sienna Shields formed the Yams Collective to address this. The group had 38 artists from different countries. Most were black and queer artists. They created a digital film about racial identity.

Shields was happy about the group's diversity. She said she often felt like the only black person at art events in New York. A curator for the Biennial saw a short video Shields made. This inspired the collective to create their film. It was a 53-minute digital piece called Good Stock on the Dimension Floor: An Opera.

However, the Biennial also included an artist named "Donelle Woolford." This artist was actually a character created by a white male professor, Joe Scanlan. He hired actresses to play "Woolford." The Yams Collective decided to remove their film from the show. They felt it was wrong to be shown alongside this "fake" artist.

Shields explained their decision. She said it was also about the Whitney Museum's history. She felt they had not done enough to change their attitudes about race. The collective believed Scanlan's inclusion showed bigger problems with racism in the art world. Instead, their film was shown at the Trinidad and Tobago Film Festival.

Other Exhibitions and Art Shows

Sienna Shields has shown her art in many places.

Solo Exhibitions

• 2009: The Other Line, Brooklyn, Superfront Gallery. This was an exhibition where she was an artist in residence.
• 2019: Invisible Woman, Chicago, Kruger Gallery.

Joint and Group Exhibitions

• 2009: Francis Young & Sienna Shields, Berlin, Kuma-Galerie. This was a show with another artist.
• 2012–2013: FORE, New York, Studio Museum in Harlem. This is a regular show that highlights important young minority artists.

Personal Life

Sienna Shields married fellow artist Chuck Close in 2013. He even included her in his 2017 art series called Subway Portraits. They had divorced by the time this series was made.

See also

• Whitney Museum of American Art
• Artivism
• Chuck Close