Ben Uri Research Unit

Born: 1980 London, England

Biography

Artist and writer, Jade Montserrat was born in London into a British-Caribbean family in 1980 and was brought up in rural Yorkshire. She studied History of Art at the Courtauld Institute of Art, University of London (2000–03), followed by Drawing at Norwich University of the Arts (2008–10). Montserrat’s work encompasses drawing, painting, performance, film, installation, sculpture, print and text. Informed by her own mixed-race background and experiences of diaspora, her work aims to challenge the entrenched racism in society, along with the disparities associated with gender, age, ability, and religion. Montserrat's multidisciplinary approach scrutinises racist and colonial pasts, drawing inspiration from the interconnection between art, activism, and the Black Atlantic's literary traditions. She interweaves quotations with her own writing, describing her watercolours and drawings as ‘dissemination tools’ (Iniva). A constant theme across her work is the portrayal of Black and female bodies in relation to care, preservation, and protection.

In 2019, Montserrat held an exhibition at the Institute of International Visual Art (INIVA) in London, showcasing how her work was nourished by diverse voices and dialogues and focusing on the dynamic interplay between text and image. The show featured a series of watercolours titled Ecclesiastes which depicted silhouettes interlaced with tiny text and dots designed to resemble skin. Montserrat commented that, 'Skin cells envelope our bodies, reflecting who we are. It's the first element you observe, setting us apart from each other' (Iniva). In 2020, Montserrat was commissioned as the first artist for the Future Collect project by INIVA and Manchester Art Gallery. This project, which spanned three years, involved a collaboration with national and regional museums and galleries to commission artists of African and/or Asian descent, who were either born in or based in Britain. Montserrat's commission centered on the 19th century African American actor Ira Aldridge (1807-67), with the initial inspiration coming from the first work acquired by Manchester Art Gallery, a portrait of Aldridge as Othello, painted by James Northcote. The commission culminated with Montserrat's solo exhibition titled Constellations: Care and Resistance at the Manchester Art Gallery in 2020.

In the weeks leading up to her exhibition's opening, Montserrat was committed under the Mental Health Act. Fearing for her mental well-being and the possibility of self-harm, her white friends contacted the emergency services. Montserrat was restrained by several white male officers, an event she described as being 'part of a longer history that is symptomatic of structural racism’ (Bethlem Gallery). She later examined this distressing experience in her 2021 exhibition at the Bethlem Gallery, titled Inside / Outside, which addressed themes around personal freedom, institutional racism, and self-perception through the viewpoint of others. In 2021, as part of London Gallery Weekend, Montserrat presented her solo show In Search of our Mothers' Gardens at Bosse & Baum in Peckham. The exhibition featured works on paper, some depicting nature as a means to explore our connection with the earth. The display included a series in which Montserrat exhibited close-ups of her torso. Adorned with intricate African hairstyles, the works were reminiscent of the images of enslaved women who braided native seeds into their hair before they were forced onto transatlantic slave ships. Other images were decorated in a manner evoking the ornate gilded tunics of Catholic saints. Montserrat often performs naked during her installations, where she inscribes poetic texts unraveling racist histories onto gallery and museum walls with black charcoal. Her early inspiration for these nude performances was the early 20th century Black entertainer and French resistance agent, Josephine Baker (1906-75), who once performed the Danse Sauvage at the Folies Bergère in Paris, wearing only a string of faux bananas draped around her hips. Montserrat stated that ‘My nudity is about reclaiming Black labour and also my Black body and sexuality for myself […] you can be quite vulnerable when you’re naked, but you’re also incredibly powerful’ (Ruiz 2021). In 2022, Montserrat, in collaboration with the artists Webb-Ellis, showcased the film triptych Clay, Peat, Cage (2015) at York Art Gallery. This work navigated through the landscape of North Yorkshire, a region where Montserrat and Webb-Ellis have spent most of their lives. It examined themes of land ownership, nature, the human body, and the concepts of belonging and alienation.

Montserrat has received the Stuart Hall Foundation Scholarship which supports her PhD at the Institute of Black Atlantic Research, University of Central Lancashire and the development of her work from her Black diasporic perspective in the north of England. In 2020, she was an artist-in-residence at East Street Arts, during which she explored subjects of land ownership, our bond with the earth, and growth. Montserrat actively collaborates with various artist and performance collectives, including Network 11, Press Room, the Conway Cohort, and Rainbow Tribe: Affectionate Movement. Montserrat has tutored on the MFA programme at the Ruskin School of Art, Oxford University. Her work is held in UK public collections including Manchester Art Gallery and the Government Art Collection.

Related books

Alexandra Moore, 'Reading and Witnessing Cage by Jade Montserrat and Webb-Ellis', Art Journal, Vol. 81, 2022
Louisa Elderton, Rebecca Morrill and Anna Lovatt, Vitamin D3: Today's Best in Contemporary Drawing (London, New York: Phaidon Press 2021)
Jade Montserrat, A Reimagining of Relations (London: Institute of International Visual Art, 2021)
Cristina Ruiz, ‘Meet Jade Montserrat, the Black Artist Who Took on the British Art Establishment’, The Art Newspaper, 27 May 2021
Jade Montserrat. ‘The Rainbow Tribe: Sets and Spectacles: A Performance Proposal’, in Nina Kane and Jude Woods eds., Reflections on Female and Trans* Masculinities and Other Queer Crossings (Cambridge Scholars Publishing, 2017)

Public collections

Government Art Collection

Related organisations

Courtauld Institute of Art, London (student)
Norwich University of the Arts (student)
Ruskin School of Art (MFA tutor)
Stuart Hall Foundation Scholarship (recipient)
University of Central Lancashire (student)

Selected exhibitions

Clay, Pit, Cage, with Webb-Ellis, York Art Gallery (2022)
Body Vessel Clay, group exhibition, Two Temple Place, London and York Art Gallery (2022)
An Infinity of Traces, group show, Lisson Gallery, London (2021)
Constellations: Care and Resistance, Manchester Art Gallery (2020)
Works on Paper, Iniva, London (2019–20)
Instituting Care, Humber Street Gallery, Hull and Bluecoat, Liverpool (2019)
Rainbow Tribe: Affectionate Movement R&R, Space, London (2018)

Ben Uri archive

Consult items in the Ben Uri archive related to [Jade Montserrat]

Ben Uri Research Unit

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

Jade Montserrat artist