Sarah Sze

Sarah Sze (/ˈziː/; born 1969) is a contemporary artist known for sculpture and installation works that employ everyday objects to create multimedia landscapes. Sze lives and works in New York City.

Sze was born in Boston in 1969. She received a BA from Yale University in Connecticut in 1991 and an MFA from New York's School of Visual Arts in 1997.

Sze draws from Modernist traditions of the found object, to build large scale installations. She uses everyday items like string, Q-tips, photographs, and wire to create complex constellations whose forms change with the viewer's interaction. The effect of this is to "challenge the very material of sculpture, the very constitution of sculpture, as a solid form that has to do with finite geometric constitutions, shapes, and content."

Sze represented the United States at the Venice Biennale in 2013, and was awarded a MacArthur Fellowship in 2003. She has exhibited in museums worldwide, and her works are held in the permanent collections of prominent institutions, including The Museum of Modern Art, the Guggenheim Museum, and the Whitney Museum of American Art, New York; The Fondation Cartier, Paris; The Museum of Contemporary Art, Chicago; The San Francisco Museum of Modern Art; and the Museum of Modern Art, Los Angeles. Sze's work has been featured in The Whitney Biennial (2000), the Carnegie International (1999) and several international biennials, including Berlin (1998), Guangzhou (2015), Liverpool (2008), Lyon (2009), São Paulo (2002), and Venice (1999, 2013, and 2015). Sze has also created public works for the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, the Walker Art Center in Minneapolis, and the High Line in New York. Sze was born in Boston, Massachusetts and lives and works in New York.

"Blueprint for a Landscape" by Sarah Sze at the 96th Street subway station

On January 1, 2017, a permanent installation commissioned by MTA Arts & Design of drawings by Sze on ceramic tiles opened in the 96th Street subway station on the new Second Avenue Subway line in New York City.

Sze is represented by Tanya Bonakdar Gallery in New York and Victoria Miro Gallery in London.

Sze lives in New York City with her husband, Siddhartha Mukherjee, the Pulitzer Prize-winning author of The Emperor of All Maladies, and their two daughters.

• 2016 – "Sarah Sze," The Rose Art Museum, Brandeis University, Waltham, MA
• 2015 – "Sarah Sze," Tanya Bonakdar Gallery, New York, NY
• 2015 – "All The Worlds Futures", 56th Venice Biennale, Venice, Italy, curated by Okwui Enwezor
• 2015 – "Sarah Sze", Victoria Miro Gallery, London, UK
• 2014 – "Sarah Sze: Triple Point (Planetarium)," Bronx Museum of the Arts, Bronx, NY
• 2013 – "Sarah Sze," The Fabric Workshop and Museum, Philadelphia, PA
• 2002 – Grow or Die, Walker Art Center, Minneapolis, MN (permanent installation)
• 2013 – Triple Point, American Pavilion, 55th Venice Biennale, Venice, Italy
• 2012 – "Sarah Sze", MUDAM Museum, Luxembourg, Luxembourg
• 2011 – Sarah Sze: Infinite Line, Asia Society, New York, NY
• 2009 – Tilting Planet, Baltic Centre for Contemporary Art, Newcastle, UK
• 2008 – "Sarah Sze", Maison Hermès 8F Le Forum, Tokyo, Japan
• 2007 – "Sarah Sze", Victoria Miro Gallery, London, UK
• 2006 – "Sarah Sze", Malmo Konsthall, Malmo, Sweden
• 2006 – Corner Plot, Doris C. Freedman Plaza, New York, NY
• 2006 – Model for Corner Plot, Agassiz House, Radcliffe Yard, Cambridge, MA
• 2005 – "Sarah Sze", Marianne Boesky Gallery, New York, NY
• 2005 – An Equal and Opposite Reaction, the Seattle Opera, Seattle, WA, (permanent installation)
• 2004 – Blue Poles, Sidney-Pacific Graduate Dormitory, Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Cambridge, MA (permanent installation)
• 2004 – "Sarah Sze: The Triple Point of Water", Fondazione Davide Halevim, Milan, Italy
• 2003 – "Sarah Sze: The Triple Point of Water", The Whitney Museum, New York, NY
• 2002 – "Sarah Sze", Boston Museum of Fine Arts, Boston, MA
• 2001 – "Sarah Sze", Center for Curatorial Studies Museum, Bard College, NY
• 2001 – Drawn, Museum of Contemporary Art, San Diego, CA
• 2000 – "Sarah Sze", Marianne Boesky Gallery, New York, NY
• 1999 – "Sarah Sze", Museum of Contemporary Art, Chicago, Chicago, IL
• 1999 – "Sarah Sze: Still Life with Flowers", Galerie fur Zeitgenossische Kunst, Leipzig, Germany
• 1999 – "Sarah Sze", Foundation Cartier pour l’art contemporain, Paris, France
• 1998 – "Sarah Sze", Institute of Contemporary Arts, London, UK
• 1997 – Migrateurs, Musee d’Art Modern de la Ville de Paris, Paris, France
• 1997 – White Room, White Columns, New York, NY

• Museum of Modern Art, New York, NY
• Whitney Museum of American Art, New York, NY
• Guggenheim Museum, New York, NY
• The New Museum, New York, NY
• San Francisco Museum of Modern Art, San Francisco, CA
• Los Angeles Museum of Contemporary Art, Los Angeles, CA
• Museum of Contemporary Art, San Diego, CA
• Detroit Institute of Art, Detroit, MI
• Albright-Knox Art Gallery, Buffalo, NY
• Walker Art Center, Minneapolis, MN
• National Gallery of Victoria, Australia
• Cartier Foundation, Paris, France
• 21st Century Museum of Art, Kanazawa, Japan
• Boston Museum of Fine Arts, Boston, MA
• Fogg Museum of Art, Boston, MA
• Museum of Contemporary Art, Chicago, IL
• National Gallery of Canada, Ottawa, Canada
• Yale University Art Gallery, New Haven, CT
• Cleveland Museum of Art, Cleveland, OH

• 2017 – Honoree, National Academy Museum and School, New York
• 2016 – Louise Blouin Foundation Award
• 2014 – Amherst Honorary Degree, Doctor of the Arts, Honoris Causa
• 2014 – School of the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston, Medal Award
• 2013 – US Representative for the Venice Biennale
• 2013 – Inducted into the National Academy
• 2012 – American Federation of the Arts Cultural Leadership Award
• 2012 – Laurie M. Tisch Award for civic responsibility and action and significant leadership in education, arts, culture, civic affairs and/or health
• 2012 – AICA Award for Best Project in a Public Space, Sarah Sze, Still Life with Landscape (Model for a Habitat), The High Line, New York, NY
• 2005 – Radcliffe Institute Fellow
• 2003 – MacArthur Fellow
• 2003 – Lotos Club Foundation Prize in the Arts
• 2002 – Atelier Calder Residency, Sache`, France
• 1999 – Louis Comfort Tiffany Award
• 1997 – The Marie Walsh Sharpe Foundation Studio Residency, New York
• 1997 – Rema Hort Mann Foundation Award
• 1997 – Paula Rhodes Memorial Award
• 1996 – School of Visual Arts Graduate Fellowship

• 1998 – Visiting Lecturer, Yale University, Intersections of Art and Architecture
• 1999–2002 – Lecturer, School of Visual Art, Master of Fine Arts Program
• 2002–2004 – Lecturer, Columbia University, School of the Arts
• 2005–2008 – Adjunct Professor, Columbia University, School of the Arts
• 2009–Present – Professor, Columbia University, School of the Arts