| Lucy Orta | |
|---|---|
| Born | 1966 Sutton Coldfield, Great Britain |
| Nationality | English |
| Field | Visual Art |
Lucy Orta is a British contemporary visual artist living and working between London and Paris where she resides since 1991. She was born in 1966 in Sutton Coldfield, Great Britain.
After graduating with an honours degree in fashion-knitwear design, she began practicing as visual artist in 1991. Her sculptural work investigates the boundaries between the body and architecture exploring their common social factors such as communication and identity. She uses the medium of sculpture, public art, video and photography to realise her work. The most emblematic artworks include: Refuge Wear and Body Architecture (1992–1998), portable architecture, lightweight and autonomous structures representing issues of survival. Nexus Architecture (1994–2002) are participative interventions in which a variable number of people wear suits connected to each other, shaping modular and collective structures, when recorded in photography and video visualise the concept of social link. Urban Life Guards (2004–2008) are wearable objects that reflect on the body as a metaphorical supportive structure.
Lucy Orta’s work has been the focus of major survey exhibitions at the Wiener Secession Vienna, Austria in 1999; CAM Florida, USA for which she received the Andy Warhol Foundation grant in 2001; Barbican Art Gallery London in 2005; She has participated in international art biennales: Venice, Italy; Kwangju, South Korea; Havana, Cuba; Johannesburg, South Africa; Athens, Greece.
In 1993 she founded Studio Orta together with her partner Jorge Orta Jorge Orta, Artist with whom she now collaborates. Their major artworks include: Connector, OrtaWater, 70 x 7 The Meal, Antarctica. Lucy + Jorge Orta began restoration on a complex of artist studios and residencies at The Dairy and Les Moulins, former industrial buildings situated along the Grand Morin river in Marne La Vallée, as a living extension of their practice: “The staging of a social bond ”( Pierre Restany, Process of Transformation. Ed. JM Place Paris 1996 [1]). Their collaborative work often deals with sustainable issues has been the focus of major exhibitions at the Fondazione Bevilacqua La Masa Venice, Italy (2005); Museum Boijmans Van Beuningen Rotterdam in 2006; Galleria Continua San Gimignano/ Beijing / Le Moulin in 2007, Biennale del fin del Mundo, Antarctica in 2007, Hangar Bicocca spazio d'arte Milano in 2008, Natural History Museum London in 2010.
In 2007 the artists received Green Leaf Award for Sculpture, for artistic excellence with an environmental message, presented by the United Nations Environment Programme in partnership with the Natural World Museum, at the Nobel Peace Centre Oslo, Norway.
Lucy Orta holds a BA Hons and an Honorary Master of Fine Art both from the School of Art and Design at Nottingham Trent University. She is a Professor of Art, Fashion and the Environment at London College of Fashion, University of the Arts London. Lucy Orta was the inaugural Rootstein Hopkins Chair at London College of Fashion from 2002–2007, and former Head of the Man & Humanity Master in Industrial Design for the Design Academy Eindhoven, a pioneering master program that stimulates socially driven and sustainable design solutions, alternative systems and products which she co-founded in 2002.