Theaster gates

The artist Theaster Gates is a master of transforming the neglected. He has turned dilapidated buildings on Chicago’s South Side into vibrant arts centers and forged charged artworks out of seemingly quotidian materials, like paintings made from segments of fire hoses—a tool of safety sometimes wielded for oppression. For his new exhibition at the National Gallery of Art in Washington, D.C., which runs through September 4, the artist is making works from the slate roof of an abandoned…

Labour remains my protest. Art and action, my only weapons.

STIR speaks to Natalia Grabowska, the project curator of Serpentine Pavilion 2022 on the inspirations, metaphors, and the-making-of-the Black Chapel by Theaster Gates.

BIOGRAPHY Theaster Gates (b. 1973) was born and raised in Chicago, where he currently lives and works. Drawing from his earlier vocational pursuits in public service, urban planning, and religious studies, Gates works to redeem spaces that have been left behind, centering his practice on the possibility of the “life within things.” Known for his recirculation of art-world capital, Gates’s recent artworks possess an intersectional relationship between space theory and land development…

The American artist and urban planner reveals his plans for the Serpentine Pavilion 2022. Black Chapel has spirituality, music and community at its heart

Find our more about the exhibition Theaster Gates: Black Vessel at 555 West 24th Street, New York. Installation views, works, editorial content, press, and more.

The Chicagoan artist curates a complex and thought-provoking ceramics exhibition in East London.

White Cube New York presents ‘Hold Me, Hold Me, Hold Me’, a solo exhibition by Theaster Gates, in which the artist creates a series of material pairings - across painting, sculpture and archival installation - indicative of musical harmonic devices.