Isaac Julien
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AboutGolden Atlantic Coaty / Coaty Atlântico Dourado (Lina Bo Bardi - A Marvellous Entanglement), 2020
Isaac Julien is as acclaimed for his fluent, arresting films as for his vibrant and inventive gallery installations. One of the objectives of his work is to break down the barriers that exist between different artistic disciplines, drawing from and commenting on film, dance, photography, music, theatre, painting and sculpture, and uniting them to construct a powerfully visual narrative.
Julien came to prominence in the film world with his 1989 drama-documentary Looking for Langston, gaining a cult following with this poetic exploration of Langston Hughes and the Harlem Renaissance. During the past three decades he has made work largely, though not exclusively, for galleries and museums, using multi-screen installations to express fractured narratives exploring memory and desire.
Julien’s major film installations include Once Again . . . (Statues Never Die), 2022, commissioned by the Barnes Foundation in celebration of its centennial, an immersive five-screen installation exploring the relationship between Dr Albert C. Barnes, who was an early US collector and exhibitor of African material culture, and the famed philosopher and cultural critic Alain Locke, known as the ‘Father of the Harlem Renaissance’; Lessons of the Hour – Frederick Douglass, 2019, a meditation on the life, words, and actions of Frederick Douglass (1818–1895), the visionary African American abolitionist and freed slave, and on the issues of social justice that shaped his life’s work; Lina Bo Bardi – A Marvellous Entanglement, 2019, reflecting on the iconic work and on the legacy of the visionary modernist architect and designer (1914–1992); PLAYTIME, 2014, which explores the dramatic and nuanced subject of financial capital; Ten Thousand Waves, 2010, exploring China's ancient past and rapidly transforming present through a series of interlocking narratives.
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Selected works
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BiographyGolden Atlantic Coaty / Coaty Atlântico Dourado (Lina Bo Bardi - A Marvellous Entanglement), 2020
Born in 1960, Isaac Julien lives and works in London and Santa Cruz, California.
He has been making films and producing film installations for over forty years, including Once Again… (Statues Never Die) (2022), Lina Bo Bardi – A Marvellous Entanglement (2019), Lessons of the Hour – Frederick Douglass (2019), Stones Against Diamonds (2015), PLAYTIME (2014), Ten Thousand Waves (2010), Western Union: Small Boats (2007), Fantôme Afrique (2005), True North (2004), Baltimore (2003), Paradise Omeros (2002), Vagabondia (2000), and Long Road to Mazatlan (1999).
Recent international solo exhibitions include Isaac Julien: I Dream a World, de Young Museum, San Francisco, USA (2025); Isaac Julien: A Marvellous Entanglement, São Paulo Museum of Art, São Paulo, Brazil (2025); Isaac Julien: Lessons of the Hour, Museum of Modern Art, New York, USA (2024); Isaac Julien: Once Again...(Statues Never Die), Museum of Contemporary Art, Sydney, Australia (2024); Isaac Julien: Once Again...(Statues Never Die), Whitney Biennale, Whitney Museum of American Art, New York, USA (2024); Isaac Julien: What Freedom Is To Me, Tate Britain, London, UK; touring to K21, Dusseldorf, Germany; Bonnefanten Museum, Maastricht, The Netherlands (2023-24); Isaac Julien: PLAYTIME, PalaisPopulaire, Berlin, Germany (2023); Isaac Julien: Lina Bo Bardi – A Marvellous Entanglement, Philadelphia Museum of Art, Philadelphia, USA (2023); Isaac Julien: Lina Bo Bardi – A Marvellous Entanglement, Yale School of Architecture, Connecticut, USA (2023); Isaac Julien: Once Again… (Statues Never Die), Barnes Foundation, Philadelphia, USA; Isaac Julien: Lina Bo Bardi – A Marvellous Entanglement, MAXXI, Rome, Italy (2020) touring to Bechtler Museum of Modern Art, Charlotte NC, USA; Galeria Helga de Alvear, Madrid, Spain; Roslyn Oxley9 Gallery, Sydney, Australia (2021-22) and Looking for Langston, Tate Britain, London, UK (2019).
Recent international group exhibitions include Superfine: Tailoring Black Style, The Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York, USA (2025); Imagining Black Diasporas: 21st Century Art and Poetics, Los Angeles County Museum of Art, Los Angeles, USA (2025); Entangled Pasts, 1768–now, Royal Academy, London, UK (2024); A Model, Mudam – The Contemporary Art Museum of Luxembourg (2024); Soulscapes, Dulwich Picture Gallery, London, UK (2024); Life Between Islands: Caribbean-British Art 1950s-Now, Tate Britain, London, UK, touring to the Art Gallery of Ontario, Toronto, Canada (2022-23); Details of Regeneration: Black Cinema 1898 – 1971, Academy Museum, Los Angeles, USA (2022) and Masculinities: Liberation through Photography, Barbican Art Gallery, London, UK, travelling to Martin-Gropius-Bau, Berlin, among others (2020).
His work is in the collections of major museums including ARos, Aarhus Kunstmuseum, Denmark; Brooklyn Museum, New York, USA; Centre Pompidou, Paris, France; De Pont Museum Collection, Tilburg, Netherlands; de Young Museum, San Francisco, CA, USA; Fundación Jumex Arte Contemporáneo, Mexico City; Guggenheim Museum, New York, USA; Hirshhorn Museum and Sculpture Garden, Smithsonian, Washington, USA; Irish Museum of Modern Art, Dublin, Ireland; LUMA Foundation, Arles, France; M+ Museum, Hong Kong, China; Moderna Museet, Stockholm, Sweden; Museum of Modern Art, New York, USA; Pérez Art Museum, Miami, USA; San Francisco Museum of Modern Art, San Francisco, CA, USA; Smithsonian American Art Museum, Washington, D.C., USA; Stedelijk Museum Amsterdam, The Netherlands; Tate, UK; Towner Eastbourne and The Whitworth, UK (Moving Image Art Fund); Whitney Museum of Art, New York, USA and Zeitz Museum of Contemporary Art Africa, Cape Town, South Africa.
In 2022, Julien received a Knighthood in the Queen’s Birthday Honours for the Platinum Jubilee year and was honoured with the esteemed Kaiserring Goslar Award.
In 2019, Julien was appointed to the faculty of the University of California, Santa Cruz. Julien and independent curator and writer Mark Nash, the former head of contemporary art at the Royal College of Art in London, developed the Isaac Julien Lab at the UC Santa Cruz campus, which provides students with the opportunity to assist Julien and Nash with project research and the production of moving image and photographic works in California and London.
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News
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Now open – The Royal Academy Summer Exhibition, featuring Isaac Julien, Grayson Perry and Conrad Shawcross
June 17, 2025On view 17 June–17 August 2025, this year's Summer Exhibition is 'dedicated to art's capacity to forge dialogues and to afford us sensitivity towards societal...Read More -
Isaac Julien: I Dream a World at the de Young, San Francisco
April 12, 2025On view 12 April–13 July 2025, the first comprehensive survey of Julien’s work in a museum setting in the US features ten major video installations...Read More -
On view at the São Paulo Museum of Art – Isaac Julien: Lina Bo Bardi – A Marvellous Entanglement
March 28, 2025On view until 3 August 2025, the Brazilian premiere of this multiscreen film installation, which traverses a collection of Bo Bardi's most iconic buildings —...Read More -
Isaac Julien at the Berlin International Film Festival
February 19, 2025The world premiere of the single-screen version of Isaac Julien’s Once Again... (Statues Never Die) features at the the 75th edition of the Berlin International...Read More -
On view at MCA Australia – Isaac Julien: Once Again… (Statues Never Die)
September 23, 2024On view 27 September 2024–16 February 2025, Isaac Julien’s mesmerising and immersive five-screen black-and-white installation film explores the relationship and correspondence between art collector Albert...Read More -
Alex Greenberger reviews Isaac Julien installations at MoMA and the Whitney Museum, on view in New York
July 12, 2024'In all three, he takes up storied figures of Black history, resisting history lessons and clichés in the process.'Read More -
Artforum commends Isaac Julien in its review of the Whitney Biennial
June 13, 2024‘In one of the Biennial’s standout works, Once Again . . . (Statues Never Die), 2022, Julien seems keenly aware that any encounter with the historical past is invariably a double-sided affair, with the present inevitably reinterpreting the past as much as the past might seek to guide the present.’ – Andrew V. UroskieRead More -
Sherrilyn Ifill and Isaac Julien on the Legacy of Frederick Douglass at MoMA
June 11, 2024Taking place at 6–7.30pm (ET) on Wednesday 12 June 2024, a special conversation on Douglass’ continuing relevance, with artist Sir Isaac Julien and civil rights leader Sherrilyn Ifill.Read More -
On view at MoMA – Isaac Julien: Lessons of the Hour
May 19, 2024On view 19 May–28 September 2024, Isaac Julien’s immersive portrait of abolitionist Frederick Douglass.Read More -
Isaac Julien: Ten Thousand Waves at Espace Louis Vuitton Osaka
March 26, 2024Created in collaboration with some of China's leading artistic voices , Ten Thousand Waves (2010) is a monumental video installation that stages a polyphony of...Read More -
Annual Stuart Hall Public Conversation with Isaac Julien
March 19, 2024The Stuart Hall Foundation welcomes Isaac Julien for the inaugural event in its Catastrophe and Emergence programme, the Foundation’s 7th Annual Stuart Hall Public Conversation...Read More -
Now open: Whitney Biennial 2024, featuring Isaac Julien
March 11, 2024The eighty-first edition of the Whitney Biennial – the longest-running survey of contemporary art in the United States – features seventy-one artists and two collectives...Read More -
On view at The Bonnefanten, Maastricht – Isaac Julien: What Freedom Is To Me
March 9, 2024Travelling from Tate Britain, London, and K21 Düsseldorf, this major survey (9 March–18 August 2024) reveals the breadth of Isaac Julien's groundbreaking oeuvre from its...Read More -
Soulscapes, featuring Njideka Akunyili Crosby and Isaac Julien, at Dulwich Picture Gallery
February 14, 2024The exhibition (14 February–2 June 2024) explores our connection with the world around us, highlighting the power of landscape art and reflecting on themes of...Read More -
Isaac Julien features in A Model at MUDAM
February 8, 2024This major group exhibition (9 February–8 September 2024) proposes a reflection on the role of the museum at the beginning of the twenty-first century. It...Read More -
Whitechapel Gallery Art Icon 2024: Isaac Julien
January 31, 2024On Monday 18 March 2024, Whitechapel Gallery hosted its annual Art Icon Gala in honour of Isaac Julien. Of the announcement, Gilane Tawadros (Whitechapel Gallery...Read More -
As announced in The New York Times, Isaac Julien is featured in the 2024 Whitney Biennial
January 25, 2024Opening on 20 March 2024 (member previews from 14 March) and titled Even Better Than the Real Thing , the Biennial includes 71 artists and...Read More -
Isaac Julien features in Entangled Pasts, 1768–now at the Royal Academy of Arts
January 25, 2024The exhibition (3 February–28 April 2024) brings together over 100 major contemporary and historic works as part of a conversation about art and its role...Read More -
Isaac Julien: Lessons of the Hour – Frederick Douglass at Tang Museum
January 18, 2024Isaac Julien’s film installation Lessons of the Hour features actor Ray Fearon in the role of Frederick Douglass, the nineteenth-century abolitionist, writer, and freed slave....Read More -
On view at The Smithsonian – Isaac Julien: Lessons of the Hour – Frederick Douglass
December 8, 2023Now on view (8 December 2023–6 December 2026), this is the first joint acquisition between the National Portrait Gallery and the Smithsonian American Art Museum,...Read More -
Isaac Julien, Alice Neel and Chris Ofili feature in the Frieze top ten shows in the UK and Ireland in 2023
December 8, 2023Isaac Julien: What Freedom Is to Me at Tate Britain, Alice Neel: Hot Off the Griddle at the Barbican Art Gallery and Chris Ofili: The...Read More -
Isaac Julien features in the 2023 ArtReview Power 100
December 1, 2023The artist is ranked number 5 in this year’s Power 100. The annual ranking of the most influential people in art. Read the full list...Read More -
Paris+ par Art Basel hosts an artist talk with Isaac Julien
October 16, 2023Inaugurating the Conversations Paris+ par Art Basel programme, this first talk examines the oeuvre of artist and filmmaker Isaac Julien and his recent landmark exhibition...Read More -
Isaac Julien speaks with Barry Jenkins as part of CHANEL Connects
October 11, 2023Isaac Julien speaks with filmmaker Barry Jenkins for season three of the culture podcast, CHANEL Connects. Listen to the full episode here - Image: Installation...Read More -
Isaac Julien: What Freedom Is To Me at K21, Düsseldorf
September 23, 2023The first survey exhibition (23 September 2023–14 January 2024) in Germany dedicated to work of Isaac Julien reveals the breadth of a groundbreaking oeuvre from...Read More -
On view at the Yale Architecture Gallery – Isaac Julien: Lina Bo Bardi – A Marvellous Entanglement
August 24, 2023Sir Isaac Julien’s immersive multichannel film installation Lina Bo Bardi—A Marvellous Entanglement (2019) offers a poetic portrait of the leading architect of Brazilian modernism, Lina...Read More -
On view at Wadsworth Atheneum Museum of Art – I Am Seen… Therefore, I Am: Isaac Julien and Frederick Douglass
May 19, 2023Isaac Julien’s immersive, multi-screen film installation Lessons of the Hour anchors this exploration of Frederick Douglass’ reflections on image-making, race, and citizenship. On view 18...Read More -
Isaac Julien: What Freedom Is To Me at Tate Britain
April 26, 2023This ambitious solo exhibition (26 April–20 August 2023) reveals the scope of Julien’s pioneering work in film and installation from the early 1980s through to...Read More -
Acclaim for Isaac Julien: What Freedom Is To Me at Tate Britain
April 25, 2023On view until 20 August 2023, this ambitious solo exhibition reveals the scope of Julien’s pioneering work in film and installation from the early 1980s...Read More -
Isaac Julien features on the cover of April’s Frieze
March 22, 2023Isaac Julien Uses the Archives as a Springboard for Reinvention By Deborah Willis and Isaac Julien Deborah Willis When I first met you, in the...Read More -
Isaac Julien: Playtime – Works from the Wemhöner Collection, now open at the PalaisPopulaire
March 8, 2023On view in Germany for the first time (8 March–10 July 2023), Playtime makes the real existence of capital tangible, also raising awareness of the...Read More -
Now open – Sharjah Biennial 15, featuring work by Isaac Julien and Wangechi Mutu
February 7, 2023Conceived by the late Okwui Enwezor and curated by Hoor Al Qasimi, Director of Sharjah Art Foundation, Sharjah Biennial 15: Thinking Historically in the Present...Read More -
Isaac Julien features in Regeneration: Black Cinema 1898–1971
January 2, 2023On view until 16 July 2023, Isaac Julien's Baltimore is presented in conjunction with the exhibition Regeneration: Black Cinema 1898–1971 . This three-channel installation pays...Read More -
Isaac Julien, Alice Neel and Paula Rego feature in The Guardian’s 2023 culture preview
December 27, 2022Isaac Julien, Alice Neel and Paula Rego feature in The Guardian’s art-design to-do list for the year ahead. A solo exhibiton by Isaac Julien is...Read More -
Isaac Julien: Lina Bo Bardi – A Marvellous Entanglement at Philadelphia Museum of Art
December 15, 2022On view from 28 January–29 May 2023, Lina Bo Bardi – A Marvellous Entanglement, 2019, explores the life, work, and legacy of the Italian-Brazilian modernist...Read More -
Isaac Julien features in Art Review’s Power 100
December 15, 2022Julien’s ambitious film-installations and videos, which blend archive images with reenactments to offer constellationlike portraits of historic Black figures, have become cult references among artists...Read More -
Isaac Julien: Lessons of the Hour – Frederick Douglass at Virginia Museum of Fine Arts
December 10, 2022On view 10 December 2022–9 July 2023, Lessons of the Hour – Frederick Douglass is an immersive and poetic meditation on the great 19th-century abolitionist....Read More -
Isaac Julien speaks to Whitewall about Once Again . . . (Statues Never Die)
December 8, 2022‘What we’re trying to do in this work is to continue that trajectory of looking at texts from let’s say, a modernist period, like Césaire,...Read More -
Isaac Julien: Kaiserring der Stadt Goslar 2022 at Mönchehaus-Museum für moderne Kunst
September 17, 2022‘It’s an honour to be part of such an esteemed company of previous winners, which consists of many artists who I greatly admire.’ – Isaac...Read More -
Once Again . . . (Statues Never Die) by Isaac Julien is reviewed The New Yorker
August 11, 2022‘Reflections interpolate visitors into the play of gazes; watching others, and being watched, in encounters with art, one becomes intimately aware of how aesthetic categories...Read More -
Isaac Julien speaks to The New York Times about Once Again... (Statues Never Die)
August 5, 2022‘I'm calling this the poetics of restitution, which is something I'm trying to explore in the work,’ Julien said... ‘The debates that we're having today...Read More -
Vogue features Isaac Julien’s Once Again... (Statues Never Die) at the Barnes Foundation
July 29, 2022At the Barnes Foundation, Isaac Julien Stages a Soaring Ode to Black Creativity Entering Isaac Julien’s newest installation, Once Again … (Statues Never Die) ,...Read More -
Royal Academy Summer Exhibition 2022
June 20, 2022This year's theme, chosen by exhibition coordinator Alison Wilding, is ‘Climate’, with rooms selected by Grayson Perry and Conrad Shawcross. Featuring works by Perry, Shawcross,...Read More -
Isaac Julien: Once Again... (Statues Never Die) at the Barnes Foundation
June 14, 2022In celebration of the Barnes centennial, the museum has commissioned Once Again . . . (Statues Never Die) , an immersive five-screen installation by artist...Read More -
Isaac Julien receives a knighthood in the Queen’s Birthday Honours
June 6, 2022Congratulations to Isaac Julien on receiving a knighthood in the Queen's Birthday Honours for the Platinum Jubilee year. The pioneering artist and filmmaker has been...Read More -
Isaac Julien: Looking for Langston at Inhotim, Brazil
May 28, 2022Julien’s seminal 1989 work is on view (from 28 May 2022) at Inhotim in Brumadinho, Brazil. Blending poetry and images, Julien draws on a lyrical...Read More -
Works by Isaac Julien go on view at Samstag Museum of Art, Adelaide
March 4, 2022On view 4 March–27 May 2022, the Australian premiere of A Marvellous Entanglement , 2019, which pays tribute to the signficant Brazilian modernist architect Lina...Read More -
Isaac Julien receives the Goslar Kaiserring 2022
February 2, 2022Isaac Julien has received the Goslar Kaiserring Award 2022 for his breaking down the barriers between different artistic disciplines by drawing from film, dance, photography,...Read More -
The Brooklyn Rail on Isaac Julien: Lina Bo Bardi — A Marvellous Entanglement
December 13, 2021'Typical of any Julien picture, Lina Bo Bardi — A Marvellous Entanglement stretches the narrative limits of film and instead presents moving versions of all...Read More -
The Observer gives ★★★★★ for Life Between Islands: Caribbean-British Art 1950s
December 5, 2021'A mind-altering portrait of British Caribbean life through art': ★★★★★ from The Observer for Life Between Islands: Caribbean-British Art 1950s . Now at Tate Britain,...Read More -
Works by Njideka Akunyili Crosby, Isaac Julien and Chris Ofili are featured in Life Between Islands at Tate Britain
November 30, 2021This landmark group exhibition (1 December 2021–3 April 2022) explores the work of artists from the Caribbean who made their home in Britain, alongside other...Read More -
Works by Isaac Julien feature in the LACMA exhibition Black American Portraits
November 7, 2021Remembering the exhibition Two Centuries of Black American Art, guest curated by David Driskell at LACMA 45 years ago, this exhibition reframes portraiture to centre...Read More -
Isaac Julien: Lina Bo Bardi – A Marvellous Entanglement opens at The Bechtler Museum of Modern Art
October 30, 2021The first US museum presentation of Lina Bo Bardi - A Marvellous Entanglement , Isaac Julien’s nine-screen film installation, which is tribute to the visionary...Read More -
The UK and European premiere of Isaac Julien’s Lessons of the Hour
July 29, 2021Edinburgh Art Festival in partnership with National Galleries of Scotland announces the UK and European premiere of Isaac Julien’s Lessons of the Hour . This...Read More -
Isaac Julien features in the Royal Academy’s Piccadilly Art Takeover
July 21, 2021From 21 July–31 August 2021, The Royal Academy of Arts, in partnership with Art of London, is welcoming people back to the capital by turning...Read More -
Masculinities: Liberation through Photography, featuring Isaac Julien, tours to LUMA, Arles
June 25, 2021This major exhibition (4 July–26 September 2021), which originated at The Barbican, considers how masculinity has been coded, performed, and socially constructed from the 1960s...Read More -
Isaac Julien judges Wallpaper* Design Awards 2021
January 7, 2021Announced as a judge for the Wallpaper* Design Awards 2021, Isaac Julien was invited to join this year's judging panel ‘out of admiration for his...Read More -
Isaac Julien: Lina Bo Bardi – A Marvellous Entanglement opens at MAXXI, Rome
September 23, 2020'Time is not linear, it is a marvellous tangle in which, at any moment, ends can be chosen and solutions invented, without beginning or end.'...Read More -
Isaac Julien talks to The New York Times
July 22, 2020Isaac Julien is one of four artists who talk about how they’ve been spending quarantine and just where, in this era of never-ending screen time, their work should live.Read More -
Reopen and extended – Isaac Julien features in Masculinities: Liberation through Photography at the Barbican
July 13, 2020This major exhibition (now extended to 23 August 2020) considers how masculinity has been coded, performed, and socially constructed from the 1960s to the present...Read More -
A new mural by Isaac Julien goes on view in La Jolla, California
April 4, 2020La Jolla, California, has just welcomed a newly installed public work by Isaac Julien. Julien’s mural, ECLIPSE (PLAYTIME) , is a still from the artist's...Read More -
Isaac Julien and Do Ho Suh feature in When Home Won’t Let You Stay: Migration through Contemporary Art opening at Minneapolis Institute of Art
February 16, 2020The exhibition (23 February–24 May 2020) considers how contemporary artists are responding to the migration, immigration, and displacement of peoples today. We are currently witnessing...Read More -
Isaac Julien creates a limited-edition boxed set of five prints for Art Fund’s Prospect Cottage campaign
January 29, 2020On the windswept shore of Dungeness, visionary British filmmaker, artist and activist Derek Jarman transformed a Victorian fisherman’s hut into a sanctuary of art and...Read More -
Isaac Julien’s Western Union: Small Boats at Neuberger Museum of Art
January 12, 2020The Neuberger Museum of Art features one of artist Isaac Julien’s most important works, Western Union: Small Boats , (on view 12 February–31 May 2020),...Read More -
Isaac Julien and Yayoi Kusama are among Artsy’s Most Influential Artists of 2019
December 11, 2019Few artists have done more to push video art forward in recent years than Isaac Julien, and in 2019, it seemed that all his efforts...Read More -
Expert Eye: Isaac Julien shares his favourite works at Art Basel Miami Beach
December 7, 2019As we traverse Art Basel in Miami Beach, Isaac Julien is mobbed and praised by collectors and fans at every other step. The London-based artist...Read More -
The US premiere of Isaac Julien: Lina Bo Bardi – A Marvellous Entanglement takes place at Art Basel Miami Beach
November 26, 2019Isaac Julien’s nine-screen installation (on view 5–8 December 2019) offers a meditation on the iconic work and legacy of the visionary modernist architect and designer,...Read More -
Guggenheim Bilbao to present Isaac Julien: Lina Bo Bardi – A Marvellous Entanglement in June 2020
November 25, 2019Isaac Julien’s Lina Bo Bardi – A Marvellous Entanglement (on view 25 June–27 September 2020) traverses a collection of Lina Bo Bardi’s most iconic buildings,...Read More -
Isaac Julien features in Love and Ethnology at HKW, Berlin
October 17, 2019Can the ethnographic gaze be “given back”, restituted? Within the context of ethnology and the aesthetic avant-garde of post-war West Germany, the exhibition examines Hubert...Read More -
A behind-the-scenes look at Ruby City
October 12, 2019A short film of Ruby City, San Antonio, Texas, featuring works by Wangechi Mutu, Do Ho Suh and interview with Isaac Julien, whose immersive video...Read More -
Isaac Julien features in Migrating Worlds: The Art of the Moving Image in Britain at Yale Center for British Art
October 10, 2019The exhibition (10 October–29 December 2019) brings together work by eight of Britain’s leading film and video artists in the first exhibition at the Yale...Read More -
Ruby City’s inaugural programme includes an exhibition dedicated to Isaac Julien’s Playtime
October 7, 2019On public view from 13 October 2019 (until 2020), Julien's immersive video installation addresses representations of global capital. Featuring actors James Franco, Maggie Cheung and...Read More -
Isaac Julien’s Lessons of the Hour – Frederick Douglass goes on view at the SCAD Museum of Art
September 24, 2019Lessons of the Hour (until 15 December 2019) is a meditation on the life, words, and actions of Frederick Douglass (1818–1895), the visionary African American...Read More -
Isaac Julien: Baltimore goes on view at the Baltimore Museum of Art
July 9, 2019Baltimore (on view 14 July 2019–5 January 2020) unfolds across three videos as a narrative of two people, filmmaker Melvin Van Peebles and an Afro-Cyborg...Read More -
Isaac Julien and Maria Balshaw in conversation
July 2, 2019A discussion between Isaac Julien and Director of Tate, Maria Balshaw (6.30–7.30pm, 5 July 2019), exploring themes of time and temporality in relation to his...Read More -
Isaac Julien is interviewed by Nick Compton for Wallpaper* – now online
June 24, 2019‘That was one of the things I realised at SESC Pompéia; there was a choreographic conversation happening in the way Lina Bo Bardi worked scenographically,’...Read More -
Isaac Julien is interviewed by and creates a limited-edition cover for Wallpaper*
June 21, 2019TheJune edition of Wallpaper* features a limited-edition subscribers' cover by the artist and, in an interview with Nick Compton, previews his major new work, Lina...Read More -
Contemporary Art Society Director Caroline Douglas writes about Isaac Julien: Lina Bo Bardi – A Marvellous Entanglement
June 7, 2019The debut of a new film installation by Isaac Julien is an event, and this new nine-screen work showing in the upper floor of the...Read More -
Isaac Julien: Looking for Langston at Tate Britain
May 13, 2019On view until 17 November 2019, Looking for Langston is a film that breaks down traditional divisions between different art forms, and explores Black, queer...Read More -
Artforum reviews Isaac Julien: Lessons of the Hour – Frederick Douglass
May 6, 2019‘Set in Rochester, the video spectacularly recasts Douglass as a homegrown internationalist.’Read More -
Isaac Julien: Playtime at LACMA
May 2, 2019Playtime (5 May–11 August 2019) is a captivating critique of the influence of capital in the art world. Playtime stars James Franco, Maggie Cheung, Colin...Read More -
Black Refractions: Highlights from the Studio Museum in Harlem travels to The Gibbes Museum
May 1, 2019This major traveling exhibition (24 May–18 August 2019) created by the American Federation of Arts (AFA) in collaboration with The Studio Museum in Harlem features...Read More -
Artforum reports on Isaac Julien’s appointment to the faculty of the University of California, Santa Cruz
March 29, 2019Julien and independent curator and writer Mark Nash, the former head of contemporary art at the Royal College of Art in London, will work together...Read More -
The world premiere of Isaac Julien’s Lessons of the Hour – Frederick Douglass at Memorial Art Gallery, University of Rochester,
March 3, 2019Lessons of the Hour (3 March–12 May 2019) is a meditation on the life, words, and actions of Frederick Douglass (1818–1895), the visionary African American...Read More -
Isaac Julien: Looking for Langston at the Linda Pace Foundation – Ruby City
February 26, 2019Ruby City is pleased to announce an exhibition of works by renowned filmmaker and installation artist, IsaacJulien, CBE RA opening at Studio on February 28,...Read More -
Isaac Julien’s The Attendant at the Berlinale Film Festival
February 5, 2019Julien's 1993 film is screened twice during The Berlinale (7–17 February 2019). In addition, the artist takes part in the Queer Academy Summit 2019 on...Read More -
Isaac Julien: The Leopard at Block Museum of Art
January 23, 2019A presentation (26 January-14 April 2019) of Julien's groundbreaking 2007 video installation The Leopard (Western Union: Small Boats) - a lyrical and visceral meditation on...Read More -
Black Refractions: Highlights from the Studio Museum in Harlem at the Museum of the African Diaspora
January 16, 2019This major traveling exhibition (16 January–14 April 2019) created by the American Federation of Arts (AFA) in collaboration with The Studio Museum in Harlem features...Read More -
Michael Jackson: On the Wall, featuring Isaac Julien and Grayson Perry, travels to the Grand Palais, Paris
November 22, 2018Travelling from the National Portrait Gallery, London, this landmark exhibition (23 November 2018–14 February 2019) explores the influence of Michael Jackson on some of the...Read More -
Isaac Julien is featured in Strata – Rock – Dust – Stars at York Art Gallery
August 26, 2018The exhibition (28 September–25 November 2018), which showcases groundbreaking moving image, new media and interactive artwork, is inspired by William Smith’s geological map of 1815,...Read More -
Work by Njideka Akunyili Crosby, Isaac Julien and Grayson Perry features in Michael Jackson: On the Wall
June 22, 2018The exhibition (28 June–21 October 2018) explores the influence of Michael Jackson on some of the leading names in contemporary art, including Njideka Akunyili Crosby...Read More -
The Royal Academy Summer Exhibition 2018, coordinated by Grayson Perry
June 12, 2018In addition to works by Perry, the exhibition (12 June–19 August 2018) also features Chantal Joffe, Isaac Julien, Idris Khan, Tal R and Conrad Shawcross....Read More -
Isaac Julien in Höhenrausch 2018
May 24, 2018Water is the theme of Höhenrausch 2018 (24 May–14 October 2018), which features work by more than 40 international artists, including The Leopard (Western Untion:...Read More -
Njideka Akunyili Crosby, Stan Douglas, Isaac Julien, Wangechi Mutu and Chris Ofili donate works to Creating Space: Artists for the Studio Museum in Harlem
May 10, 2018Sotheby's New York hosts the viewing (4 – 16 May 2018) and auction (16, 17 May 2018) of works to benefit the Studio Museum's new...Read More -
Isaac Julien: Ten Thousand Waves at The Whitworth
March 30, 2018Ten Thousand Waves (on display 30 March–28 August 2018) is the most recent in a series of major moving image acquisitions by the Whitworth, and...Read More -
Isaac Julien’s Ten Thousand Waves in The Rebellion of Moving Image at MOCA Taipei
March 3, 2018The nine-screen installation of Ten Thousand Waves continues its world tour as part of the exhibition (3 March – 6 May 2018), curated by Huang...Read More -
Isaac Julien talks to the Guardian about Looking for Langston, being shown in Sydney as part of the 40th Mardi Gras
February 17, 2018In Sydney for the 40th Mardi Gras, the pioneering proponent of New Queer Cinema reflects on once radical ideas that have made it to the...Read More -
Isaac Julien is elected as a Royal Academician
February 9, 2018The Royal Academy of Arts has elected Isaac Julien as a Royal Academician, following a recent General Assembly. Julien's major exhibition Playtime is on view...Read More -
Work by Isaac Julien is featured in More of an Avalanche at Wysing Arts Centre
February 6, 2018The exhibition (11 February – 8 April 2018) considers what it takes for people in marginalised positions to speak out and the mechanisms that get...Read More -
Isaac Julien talks and screenings in Sydney
February 5, 201814 February 2018 Looking for Langston , 1989 film screening and artist talk at the Art Gallery of New South Wales 18 February 2018 A...Read More -
Isaac Julien’s Western Union: Small Boats at ARoS Aarhus Kunstmuseum
February 3, 2018A presentation (3 February – 27 May 2018) in the Focus Gallery of the award-winning 2007 film which portrays people attempting to cross continents. The...Read More -
SF Weekly reviews Isaac Julien: Playtime
December 6, 2017SFAI's debut show at Fort Mason Center for Arts & Culture contains three outstanding film installations. By Peter Lawrence Kane Since it appears we're truly,...Read More -
The San Francisco Chronicle reviews Isaac Julien: Playtime at Fort Mason Center for Arts & Culture
December 1, 2017By Charles Desmarais For those of us who were around to see the first video works presented in art museum and gallery exhibitions, our memories...Read More -
Isaac Julien: Playtime at Fort Mason Center for Arts & Culture, San Francisco
December 1, 20171 December 2017 – 11 February 2018 Fort Mason Center for Arts & Culture (FMCAC) is pleased to announce Playtime , an ambitious exhibition of...Read More -
Idris Khan and Isaac Julien donate works to Art For Grenfell
October 9, 2017The auction (which took place on 16 October 2017) to raise money for those affected by the Grenfell Tower fire raised £1.9million in total. Isaac...Read More -
Now available as a podcast: Frieze Masters Talks – Isaac Julien in conversation with Nicholas Cullinan
October 6, 2017Now available as a podcast: Isaac Julien in conversation with Nicholas Cullinan, Director of the National Portrait Gallery. In this hour-long talk, Julien and Cullinan...Read More -
Into the Unknown: A Journey Through Science Fiction, featuring Isaac Julien, tours to Onassis Cultural Centre, Athens
September 25, 20179 October 2017 - 14 January 2018 Isaac Julien’s 2004 work Encore II (Radioactive) is a short film study inspired by a character from the...Read More -
Zeitz MOCAA opens, featuring work by Isaac Julien, Njideka Akunyili Crosby, Wangechi Mutu and Chris Ofili
September 22, 2017Zeitz Museum of Contemporary Art Africa (Zeitz MOCAA) collects, preserves, researches, and exhibits twenty-first century art from Africa and its Diaspora; hosts international exhibitions; develops...Read More -
Artforum reviews Isaac Julien: “I dream a world” Looking for Langston
September 4, 2017Isaac Julien at Victoria Miro By Himali Singh Soin When astronomers in fifth-century India conceptualized the zero, they gave the idea of nothing a figurative...Read More -
Isaac Julien interviewed as part of BBC Two’s Queer as Art
July 25, 2017First broadcast on Saturday 29 July 2017, and available on BBC iPlayer, the hour-long programme celebrates the LGBTQ contribution to the arts in Britain in...Read More -
Isaac Julien in Coming Out: Sexuality, Gender and Identity at Walker Art Gallery
July 25, 201728 July - 5 November 2017 The Walker Art Gallery will mark the 50th anniversary of the partial decriminalisation of male homosexual acts in England...Read More -
The soundtrack to Isaac Julien’s Looking for Langston is released by The Vinyl Factory
July 20, 2017Shot in sumptuous monochrome Looking for Langston is a lyrical exploration – and recreation – of the private world of poet, social activist, novelist, playwright,...Read More -
Studio International reviews Isaac Julien: “I dream a world” Looking for Langston
July 6, 2017By Alexander Glover “Out of the little breath of oblivion that is night, take just one star,” said Langston Hughes in his poem Stars (1921)....Read More -
This is tomorrow reviews Isaac Julien: “I dream a world” Looking for Langston
July 3, 2017By Joan Lee Isaac Julien made his entrance into the art world in the late 1980s with his seminal film ‘Looking for Langston’, a contemplative...Read More -
Isaac Julien special event: A screening of The Passion of Remembrance, followed by an in conversation with the artist and Karen Alexander
July 1, 20177pm, Wednesday 23 August 2017 This special event at South London Gallery features a screening of Sankofa Film and Video Collective’s The Passion of Remembrance...Read More -
Isaac Julien in The Place is Here at South London Gallery
June 21, 201722 June - 10 September 2017 The Place is Here presents work by over twenty black artists and collectives working in 1980s Britain. Shown across...Read More -
Isaac Julien appointed CBE in the Queen’s Birthday 2017 Honours List
June 16, 2017Artist and filmmaker Isaac Julien has been appointed a Commander of the Order of the British Empire for services to the Arts in the Queen’s...Read More -
Victoria Miro artists at the Royal Academy Summer Exhibition
June 13, 201713 June - 20 August 2017 Works by Wangechi Mutu, Varda Caivano, Secundino Hernández, Isaac Julien and Conrad Shawcross are included in the 2017 RA...Read More -
SOLD OUT Isaac Julien: Looking for Langston screening and talk at Tate Britain
June 13, 2017This event has now sold out Thursday 20 July, 7-9pm £8, £6 concessions A rare opportunity to see Isaac Julien's celebrated film in its original...Read More -
Just published – Isaac Julien: Looking for Langston, a special edition artist’s book including limited signed copies
June 12, 2017Victoria Miro is delighted to announce the publication of Isaac Julien: Looking for Langston , a lavishly illustrated, limited edition book by the internationally acclaimed...Read More -
Isaac Julien announced as winner of the Charles Wollaston Award at the Royal Academy Summer Exhibition
June 7, 2017The prestigious Charles Wollaston Award, one of the most significant art prizes in the country, has been won by Isaac Julien for his film Western...Read More -
Isaac Julien’s Encore II (Radioactive) as part of the Barbican’s Into the Unknown: A Journey through Science Fiction
June 3, 2017Isaac Julien’s 2004 work Encore II (Radioactive) is a short film study inspired by a character from the writings of Octavia Butler, an African American...Read More -
Victoria Miro at Photo London with a special presentation of Isaac Julien’s Looking for Langston
May 15, 201718 - 21 May 2017 Victoria Miro is delighted to participate in Photo London . Isaac Julien’s seminal work Looking for Langston (1989/2017) is the...Read More -
Isaac Julien featured in Diaspora Pavilion, Venice Biennale 2017
May 12, 2017Presented by International Curators Forum (ICF) and University of the Arts London (UAL) at the Palazzo Pisani S. Marina during the 57th Venice Biennale (13...Read More -
Isaac Julien in The Restless Earth, Triennale di Milano
April 28, 201728 April - 20 August 2017 The Restless Earth borrows its title from a collection of poems by Édouard Glissant, a Caribbean writer who probed...Read More -
Isaac Julien appointed Art Fund trustee
February 16, 2017London’s Art Fund has announced that it has appointed artist Isaac Julien as a new trustee. The national fundraising arts charity supports curatorial projects, helps...Read More -
Isaac Julien: Playtime at Platform-L Contemporary Art Center, Seoul
February 2, 2017Curated by Manu Park, the solo exhibition (22 February - 30 April 2017) includes PLAYTIME (Seven Screen Installation), 2014, which explores the dramatic and nuanced...Read More -
Keynote Presentation: Isaac Julien in His Own Words at Royal Ontario Museum
January 18, 2017Jan 24 Isaac Julien discusses the inspiration behind Isaac Julien: Other Destinies and more recent developments in his work. Lecture followed by a conversation with...Read More -
Isaac Julien films included in Hammer Museum's The Workshop Years: Black British Film and Video after 1981
December 10, 2016Isaac Julien's films are included in screenings from 3-7 January 2017. Independent black British filmmaking saw an increased urgency and viability in the aftermath of...Read More -
Isaac Julien in Things Fall Apart at Africa.Cont, Lisbon
December 6, 2016Things Fall Apart (7 December 2016 - 12 March 2017) will feature artists, filmmakers and groups from across Africa, Asia, Europe and North America. Drawing...Read More -
Isaac Julien in The Place Is Here, Nottingham Contemporary
December 1, 2016February 4 – April 30, 2017 Nottingham Contemporary is presenting a major new exhibition, The Place Is Here , in collaboration with the Van Abbemuseum...Read More -
Isaac Julien: Other Destinies at The Royal Ontario Museum
October 25, 2016ROM Contemporary Culture to present Isaac Julien: Other Destinies Julien’s work presented in Toronto in partnership with OCAD University and The Images Festival. ROM display...Read More -
Isaac Julien: Playtime & KAPITAL Conference and Book Launch
September 24, 2016This special event brings together artists, curators, writers and academics to discuss the intersection between art, money and globalisation and its impact on all our...Read More -
Just out: Protest publication
September 23, 2016This publication accompanies Protest at Victoria Miro, 23 September - 5 November 2016, an exhibition of historical and contemporary works by artists concerned with the...Read More -
Power to... the art of protest, as featured in The Observer
September 23, 2016Politically engaged art is thriving again, finding new ways to challenge in a complex digital world. We look at the rich history of protest art...Read More -
Isaac Julien: Ten Thousand Waves at MAC Niterói, Brazil
September 3, 20163 September - 23 October 2016 MAC Niterói Mirante da Boa Viagem, s/nº - Boa Viagem, Niterói 24210-390 Rio de Janeiro TEN THOUSAND WAVES features...Read More -
Isaac Julien in Some Are Nights Other Stars, Towner Art Gallery, Eastbourne
July 23, 2016Presented as an interrelated set of experiences, the exhibition (until 25 September 2016) weaves together concerns about land, architecture, progress, utopian dreams, inequality, trauma and...Read More -
Isaac Julien in Made You Look: Dandyism and Black Masculinity at The Photographers' Gallery
July 15, 201615 Jul - 25 Sep 2016 The Photographers’ Gallery presents Made You Look: Dandyism and Black Masculinity , a group exhibition exploring the identity of...Read More -
Isaac Julien: Ten Thousand Waves at Fondation Louis Vuitton
27 January – 5 September 201627 January - 29 August 2016. The current hang of The Collection is dedicated to Chin a. Gallery 4: The exhibition concludes with the installation...Read More -
Isaac Julien: Ten Thousand Waves featured in The Wall Street Journal
November 22, 2013Immigrant Drama on Nine Screens. By Kelly Crow. In the late 1980s, Isaac Julien became a hit of London's contemporary art scene by projecting his...Read More
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Gallery Exhibitions
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Isaac Julien: Once Again… (Statues Never Die) – Photographs
2 May – 4 Jun 2023 London Gallery IIVictoria Miro is delighted to present an exhibition of newly conceived photographic works by Isaac Julien, focusing on his latest work, Once Again… (Statues Never Die) . Once Again… (Statues...Learn More -
The Sky was Blue the Sea was Blue and the Boy was Blue
24 Feb – 30 Apr 2021 Miro PresentsAn exhibition of work by 19 artists celebrating the colour blue, available online and on Vortic as part of The London Collective.Learn More -
Isaac Julien: Lina Bo Bardi – A Marvellous Entanglement
7 Jun – 27 Jul 2019 London Gallery IIsaac Julien’s nine-screen installation, premiering at Victoria Miro, traverses a collection of Lina Bo Bardi’s most iconic buildings, offering a meditation on the iconic work and on the legacy of...Learn More -
Isaac Julien: “I dream a world” Looking for Langston
18 May – 29 Jul 2017 London Gallery IIIsaac Julien’s seminal work Looking for Langston (1989/2017) is the focus of this exhibition of newly-conceived, large-scale and silver gelatin photographic works and archival material. Shot in sumptuous monochrome Looking...Learn More -
Protest
23 Sep – 5 Nov 2016 London Gallery IDoug Aitken, Jules de Balincourt, Vlassis Caniaris, Elmgreen & Dragset, Ian Hamilton Finlay, Christian Holstad, Isaac Julien, Yayoi Kusama, Wangechi Mutu, Alice Neel, Chris Ofili, Richard Prince, Sarah Sze, Wolfgang Tillmans, Rirkrit Tiravanija and Kara Walker.Learn More -
Isaac Julien: PLAYTIME (Seven Screen Installation)
24 Jan – 1 Mar 2014 London Gallery IIsaac Julien's PLAYTIME is an ambitious new body of work exploring the dramatic and nuanced subject of capital. Featuring the world premiere of a seven-screen installation at Victoria Miro Wharf...Learn More -
Isaac Julien: PLAYTIME (Photographic Works)
24 Jan – 1 Mar 2014 Victoria Miro MayfairIsaac Julien's PLAYTIME is an ambitious new body of work exploring the dramatic and nuanced subject of capital. Featuring the world premiere of a seven-screen installation at Victoria Miro Wharf...Learn More -
Isaac Julien: Ten Thousand Waves
7 Oct – 13 Nov 2010 London Gallery IIIsaac Julien's critically acclaimed, nine screen film installation TEN THOUSAND WAVES - starring Maggie Cheung, the legendary siren of Chinese cinema - is to receive its London premiere at the...Learn More -
Isaac Julien: True North & Fantôme Afrique
14 Oct – 12 Nov 2005 London Gallery IThis October, Victoria Miro Gallery will present the UK premiere of True North and Fantôme Afrique , two audiovisual installations by celebrated artist and filmmaker Isaac Julien, alongside associated photographic...Learn More -
Isaac Julien: Paradise Omeros and Baltimore
9 Sep – 11 Oct 2003 London Gallery I'Few artists have cut as impressive a swathe between structural and narrative film as the British artist, Isaac Julien. His film installations effortlessly alternate between the specific and the elliptical,...Learn More -
Isaac Julien: After Mazatlan
11 – 29 Sep 2000 London Gallery IVictoria Miro is pleased to present an exhibition of photographs by Isaac Julien which were made in collaboration with Hare and Hound Press during Julien’s recent residency at ArtPace in...Learn More -
Raw
7 May – 30 Jun 2000 London Gallery IYayoi Kusama. Francesca Woodman, Robin Lowe, Adriana Varejão, Isaac Julien, Doug Aitken, Abigail Lane, Hadrian Pigott, Brad Lochore, Cecily Brown, Chris Ofili, Andreas Gursky, Ian Hamilton Finlay, Inez van Lamsweerde,...Learn More -
Isaac Julien: Three
10 – 30 Sep 1999 Victoria Miro Cork StreetThree is the most recent of Isaac Julien's works to be made specifically for a gallery context, combining a full screening of the film with three looped sequences back-projected side by side and presented almost as a moving photographic triptych.
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