Ben Uri Research Unit

for the study and digital recording of the Jewish, Refugee and wide Immigrant contribution to British visual culture since 1900.


Lubaina Himid artist

Lubaina Himid CBE was born in Zanzibar (modern-day Tanzania) in 1954; following the death of her father, she immigrated to the UK at the age of four months with her mother, a textile designer. She studied Theatre Design at Wimbledon College of Art, followed by an MA in Cultural History from the Royal College of Art and curated the seminal exhibition, The Thin Black Line, at the ICA in 1985. Over the last 30 years she has exhibited widely, both in Britain and Internationally; she is the 2017 winner of the Turner Prize and Professor of Contemporary Art at the University of Central Lancashire.

Born: 1954 Sultanate of Zanzibar (now Tanzania)

Year of Migration to the UK: 1954


Biography

Artist and curator Lubaina Himid was born in Zanzibar (modern-day Tanzania) in 1954. Following the death of her father, she immigrated to the UK at the age of four months with her mother, a textile designer, who encouraged her interest in art. She studied Theatre Design at Wimbledon College of Art, which she chose for its connection to radical politics, and in particular Black politics, afterwards completing an MA in Cultural History at the Royal College of Art. Her art investigates historical figurative representations of the African diaspora and highlights its important cultural contribution to the contemporary landscape. Her immersive work invites engagement and dialogue with an audience. In her own words, 'The point I am often exploring vis-à-vis the black experience is that of being so very visible and different in the White Western everyday yet so invisible and disregarded in the cultural, historical, political or economic record or history'.

Himid was one of the pioneers of the Black Art Movement in the 1980s, which offered a forum for black artists exploring the social and political issues surrounding black history and identity. In 2011 she co-curated, with Paul Goodwin, The Thin Black Line(s) exhibition at Tate Britain (2011), which revisited the original seminal exhibition, The Thin Black Line, that she curated at the Institute for Contemporary Arts in 1985, as well as her two earlier important curatorial projects, Five Black Women at the Africa Centre (1983), and Black Women Time Now at the Battersea Arts Centre (1983-4). In 2017 Himid became the first black woman and the oldest artist to win the Turner Prize. Pointing to the presence of the black figure in European art history, her Turner Prize-winning installation Naming the Money showcased 100 of her signature 'cut-outs' – life-size, painted figures representing slaves and servants in the royal courts of eighteenth-century Europe. Each cut-out had a name, a real identity and profession: ceramicists, herbalists, toy makers, dog trainers, viola da gamba players, drummers, dancers, shoemakers, map makers and painters. This work offered an alternate history, one in which the wide-ranging, creative contributions of people of colour in European society dating back to the sixteenth century were highlighted.

Her later work has engaged with museum collections in which she has creatively interrogated the history and representation of the African diaspora and looked at the role of museums in discussion around cultural histories. In 2018, Himid became the first Guardian artist-in-residence, a role that allowed her to draw attention to racial bias in newspapers and journalism. She was made an MBE in 2010 for services to black women's art and a CBE in the 2018 Queen's Birthday Honours 'for services to art'. Himid lives and works in Preston and is Professor of Contemporary Art at the University of Central Lancashire. He work is represented in numerous UK public collections including the Arts Council, Birmingham City Art Gallery, Tate, The International Slavery Museum in Liverpool, and the V&A.

Related books

  • C.-M. Bernier, A. Rice and H. Durkin (eds.), Inside the Invisible: Memorialising Slavery and Freedom in the Life and Works of Lubaina Himid (Liverpool: Liverpool University Press, 2019)
  • E. Speight and L. Himid (eds.), Practising Place: Creative and Critical Reflections on Place (Sunderland: Art Editions North, 2019)
  • N. Bell, Lubaina Himid. Work from underneath (New York: New Museum New York, 2019)
  • L. Panting and M. Ståhl (eds.), Lubaina Himid: Workshop Manual (London: Koenig Books, 2018)
  • S. Orlando and C. La Via (eds.), British Black Art: Debates on Western Art History (Paris: Dis Voir, 2016)
  • L. Himid, 'Imaginary Black Topographies: What Are Monuments For?', in J. Ambroise and S. Bröck-Sallah (eds.), Black Knowledges/Black Struggles: Essays in Critical Epistemology (Liverpool: Liverpool University Press, 2015), pp. 170-183
  • D. Arnold, A Companion to British Art: 1600 to the Present (Chichester: Wiley, 2013)
  • Sutapa Biswas et al. (eds.), Thin Black Line(s) (London: Making Histories Visible Project, Centre for Contemporary Art, UCLAN, 2011)
  • S. Hall, 'Black Diaspora Artists in Britain: Three 'Moments' in Post-War History', History Workshop Journal, No. 61, 2006, pp. 1-24
  • D. A. Bailey, I. Baucom and Sonia Boyce (eds.), Shades of Black: Assembling Black Art in 1980s Britain (Durham: Duke University Press, 2005)
  • L. Whetstone, Lubaina Himid : Naming the Money (Newcaste upon Tyne: University of Newcastle upon Tyne, 2004)
  • R. Araeen, 'The Success and Failure of Black Art', Third Text Vol. 18, No. 2, 2004, pp. 135-152
  • G. Perry, Difference and Excess in Contemporary Art: The Visibility of Women’s Practice (Oxford: Blackwell, 2004)
  • Lubaina Himid. Double Life (Bolton: Bolton Museum & Art Gallery, 2001)
  • L. Himid and J. Beckett, Lubaina Himid: Plan B (St. Ives: Tate Publishing, 1999)
  • L. Himid, Zanzibar (Llandudno: BMostyn Art Gallery, 1999)
  • G. Pollock (ed.), Generations & Geographies in the Visual Arts: Feminist Readings (London: Routledge, 1996)
  • P. Gilroy, Picturing Blackness in British Art 1700s-1990s (London: Tate Publishing, 1995)
  • Lubaina Himid: Beach House (Wrexham: Wrexham Library Arts Centre, 1995)
  • O. Oguibe (ed.), Seen/Unseen: Uzo Egonu, Libaina Himid, Olu Oguibe, Folake Shoga, Yinka Shonibare (Liverpool: Bluecoat Gallery, 1994)
  • Lubaina Himid: Revenge (Rochdale: Art Gallery, 1992)
  • L. Himid and M. Sulter, New Robes for MaShulan: Lubaina Himid: Work Past and Present (Rochdale, 1987)

Public collections

Related organisations

  • Wimbledon School of Art (student)
  • Royal College of Art (student)
  • University of Central Lancashire (Professor of Contemporary Art)
  • Royal Academy of Art (academician)
  • Lowry Arts Centre, Manchester (trustee)
  • Arts Council England (board member)

Related web links

Selected exhibitions

  • Lubaina Himid, Tate Modern (2021)
  • Life Between Islands: Caribbean-British Art 1950s-Now, Tate (2021)
  • Glasgow International Festival, Glasgow (2018)
  • Meticulous Observations and Naming the Money, Walker Art Gallery, Liverpool (2018)
  • Gifts to Kings, MRAC Languedoc Roussillon Midi-Phyrénées, Sérignan, France (2018)
  • Hard Times, Harris Museum & Gallery, Preston (2018)
  • Our Kisses Are Petals, Baltic Centre for Contemporary Art, Gateshead (2018)
  • Tate Turner Prize, Feren's Gallery, Hull (2017)
  • The Truth Is Never Watertight, Badischer Kunstverein, Karlsruhe, Germany (2017)
  • Invisible Strategies, Modern Art Gallery, Oxford (2017)
  • Navigation Charts, Spike Island, Bristol (2017)
  • Warp and Weft, Firstsite, Colchester (2017)
  • The Place is Here, Nottingham Contemporary (2017)
  • Gwangju Biennale (2014)
  • Hollybush Gardens, London (2013)
  • Moments that Matter/ Cultural Olympiad Harris Museum & Art Gallery (2012)
  • Migrations: Journeys into British Art, Tate Britain, London (2012)
  • Tailor Striker Singer Dandy Platt Hall Museum of Costume, Manchester Galleries (2011)
  • Jelly Mould Pavilions, Sudley House, Liverpool and Liverpool Museums (2010)
  • Kangas and Other Stories, Peg Alston Gallery, New York (2008)
  • Talking On Corners Speaking In Tongue, Harris Museum & Art Gallery, Preston (2007)
  • Swallow Hard The Lancaster Dinner Service, Judges Lodgings, Lancaster (2007)
  • Uncomfortable Truths: The Shadow of Slave Trading on Contemporary Art, Victoria and Albert Museum (2007)
  • Migratory Aesthetics, Leeds University, Yorkshire (2006)
  • Naming The Money, Hatton Gallery, Newcastle (2004)
  • Fabrications, C.U.B.E, Manchester (2002)
  • Inside the Invisible, St. Jargons Museum, Bergen Norway (2001)
  • Double Life, Bolton Museum & Art Gallery (2001)
  • Zanzibar, Oriel Mostyn, Llandudno, Wales (1999)
  • Plan B, Tate St Ives (1999)
  • Venetian Maps, Harris Museum & Art Gallery, Preston (1997)
  • Portraits & Heroes, Peg Alston Gallery, New York (1996)
  • Beach House, Wrexham Arts Centre & Tour, Wrexham (1995)
  • Vernets Studio, Transmission Gallery, Glasgow and 5th Havana Biennial, Cuba (1994)
  • African Gardens, Black Art Gallery, London (1993)
  • Revenge, Rochdale Art Gallery & South Bank Centre, London (1992)
  • The Ballad of the Wing, Chisenhale Gallery, London (1989)
  • New Robes for MaShulan, Rochdale Art, Gallery (1987)
  • A Fashionable Marriage, Pentonville Gallery, London (1986)
  • The Thin Black Line, ICA (1985) (curator)
Ben Uri archive

Consult items in the Ben Uri archive related to [Lubaina Himid]

Ben Uri library

Publications related to [Lubaina Himid] in the Ben Uri Library