Bethany Collins is the recipient of the 2023 Gwendolyn Knight and Jacob Lawrence Prize, awarded biennially by SAM since 2009 to an early career Black artist—defined loosely as an artist in the first decade of their career.
Collins’s conceptually driven work uses language as both subject and medium to explore the nuances and intersections of language, racial identity, and American history. The artist’s work was featured at SAM previously in Jacob Lawrence: The American Struggle (2021) and will present new work in this 2024 solo show.
Bethany Collins (b. 1984) lives and works in Chicago, IL. Her multidisciplinary practice encompasses the mediums of drawing, sculpture, book arts, and sound installation. Collins has been the subject of numerous solo exhibitions, including Accord, Jule Collins Smith Museum of Fine Art at Auburn University, AL (2024); America: A Hymnal, Peabody Essex Museum, Salem, MA (2023); Evensong, Frist Art Museum, Nashville, TN (2021); and Chorus, Contemporary Art Museum St. Louis, MO (2019), among others. Her work is represented in the collections of The Art Institute of Chicago, IL; Birmingham Museum of Art, AL; The Morgan Library & Museum, New York, NY; Smart Museum of Art, The University of Chicago, IL; and The Studio Museum in Harlem, NY, among others.