Caitlin Cherry
Caitlin Cherry
b. 1987, Chicago, IL
Lives and works in Mérida,Yucatán, México
Cherry’s paintings feature larger-than-life subjects in striking color: Black femme figures, familiar composites drawn from an image culture that thrives on appropriating these women’s likeness while rarely crediting their creativity. Across her recent work, these women’s bodies are overlaid with cryptic alphanumeric symbols—kaleidoscopic incursions that refer back to the codes and algorithms that power our media landscape, fueling the algorithmic tools of Black culture’s dissemination and extraction. They also play at themes of authenticity and authentication, gesturing towards the PIN numbers and digital locks that facilitate the online sale of artificially-editioned art. While the women on view would seem to bare it all, the invocation of cryptography suggests a layer of nuance and agency—a reproach to the traditional female nude figure who passively abides her own sexualization.
Education
2012
M.F.A., Columbia University School of the Arts, New York, NY
2010
B.F.A., School of the Art Institute of Chicago, Chicago, IL
2009
Yale University, Summer School of Art, Norfolk, CT
Solo Exhibitions
2022
Luncheon on the Grass, Jeffrey Deitch, Los Angeles, CA
Late Night Enterprise, Perrotin Gallery, New York, NY
2020
Crichoues Indignation, The Hole, New York, NY
Corps Sinore, Luis De Jesus, Los Angeles, Los Angeles, CA
2019
Threadripper, Luis De Jesus Los Angeles, Los Angeles, CA
Luce Gallery, Turin, Italy
2018
Dirty Power, Providence College Galleries, Providence, RI
Etherpaint, The Anderson, Virginia Commonwealth University, Richmond, VA
Select Group Exhibitions
2023
I’ll be Your Mirror: Art and the Digital Screen, The Modern Art Museum of Fort Worth, Fort Worth, TX
The Culture Hip Hop and Contemporary Art in the 21st Century, The Baltimore Museum of Art, Baltimore, MD
Opulence: Performative Wealth and the Failed American Dream, Bemis Center, Omaha, NE
ZONA MACO, The Hole, Mexico City, Mexico
2022
NADA Miami, The Hole, Miami, FL
2021
Density Betrays Us, curated by Andrew Woolbright, Angela Dufresne, Melissa Ragona, The Hole, New York, NY
Born in Flames, curated by Jasmine Wahi, Bronx Museum of Art, New York, NY
Black Femme: Sovereign of WAP and the Virtual Realm, curated by Christina Ine-Kimba Boyle, Canada, New York, NY
2020
Illumination: 21st Century Interactions with Art + Science + Technology, San Diego Art Institute, San Diego, CA
2019
On Their Own Terms, Windgate Center of Art + Design, University of Arkansas at Little Rock, Little Rock, AR
2018
A Wild Ass Beyond: ApocalypseRN, Performance Space, New York, NY
Punch, Jeffrey Deitch, New York, NY
Touchstone, American Medium, New York, NY
Witness: Themes of Social Justice in Contemporary Printmaking and Photography, Hallie Ford Museum of Art, Salem, OR
THE SUN IS GONE BUT WE HAVE THE LIGHT, Unclebrother/Gavin Brown’s Enterprise, Hancock, NY
SOUL RECORDINGS, Luis De Jesus Los Angeles, Los Angeles, CA
2016
Objected: Shaping Sculpture in Contemporary Art, Utah Museum of Contemporary Art, Salt Lake City, UT
2015
Banksy’s Dismaland Bemusement Park, Weston-super-Mare, UK
Civilization and its Discontents: SAIC 150th Anniversary Alumni Exhibition. Selections from 1985-2015, Sullivan Galleries, Chicago, IL
Made in N.Y., Blueshift Gallery, Miami, FL
8 Painters, Danese Corey Gallery, New York, NY
Immediate Female, Judith Charles Gallery, New York, NY
2014
Don’t Look Now, Zach Feuer Gallery, New York, NY
This Is What Sculpture Looks Like, Postmasters Gallery, New York, NY
Whitney Houston Biennial, DUMBO, Brooklyn, NY
2013
Corpus Americus, Driscoll Babcock Gallery, New York, NY
Recess, curated by Tempest Hazel, South Side Community Art Center, Chicago, IL
2012
Fore, Studio Museum of Harlem, New York, NY
Summer Show, Kravets Wehby Gallery, New York, NY
Retrospective of S, curated by Jonathan Safran Foer and Sam Messer, Fredericks & Freiser Gallery, New York, NY
Columbia University MFA Thesis Exhibition, Fisher Landau Center for Art, Queens, NY
NEXT GENERATION, Contemporary Wing, Washington, D.C.
2011
Paperwork, Kravets Wehby Gallery, New York, NY
1st Year MFA Exhibition, Wallach Art Gallery, Columbia University, New York, NY
Awards/Residencies
2017
Artist-in-residence, University Museum of Contemporary Art/UMass Amherst Printmaking Department
2016
Robert Rauschenberg Residency
2015
Leonore Annenberg Fellowship
2012
Lotos Foundation Grant Recipient
2009
Ellen Battel Stoeckel Fellowship, Yale University
Lectures/Conferences
2017
Visiting Artist Lecture, Boston University, Boston, MA
Panelist, Black Aesthetics Conference, Hampshire College, Amherst, MA
Panelist, 1:1 Systems Theory in Practice Since WWII Conference, Yale University, New Haven, CT
2016
Panelist, iHistory: Everyday Life and Culture in the Early 21st Century, Queens Museum, Queens, NY
Caitlin Cherry’s Black Military Aesthetix, Afrofuturism Conference 2016, The New School, New York, NY
Panelist, Hypervisibility of Black Image Online, Afrofuturism Conference 2016, The New School, New York, NY
2015
Caitlin Cherry’s FB Google IMG Search Matrix, Recess Art, New York, NY
Panelist, SAIC 150th Alumni Panel, EXPO Chicago, Navy Pier, Chicago, IL
Panelist, How Do You Do What You Do?, Wallach Art Gallery, Columbia University, New York, NY
2014
Visiting Artist Lecture, Illinois State University, Bloomington, IL
2013
In Conversation with Nick Faust, Brooklyn Museum, Brooklyn, NY
Artist Talk, School of the Art Institute of Chicago, Chicago, IL
Mythological Creatures in Art – In Conversation with Lauren Haynes, Yashua Klos, Firelei Baez, Studio Museum of Harlem, New York, NY
Selected Bibliography
2019
Tory Akers, “Respectability Politics and Painting: An Interview with Caitlin Cherry,” Artspace, June 15
Caitlin Cherry, “Pictorial SpaceX,” Art21 Magazine, Spring Issue: “21st Century Body,” May 30
Joel Kuennen, “Caitlin Cherry,” Art in America, March 1
Cate McQuaid, “Porn stars are powerful in the artist’s eyes,” The Boston Globe, February 20