Dame Sonia Boyce is a British Afro-Caribbean artist who lives and works in London. Over her 30-year career Boyce has emerged as one of the leading figures in the British art scene.
Boyce studied at Stourbridge College, West Midlands. Her early work addressed issues of race and gender in the media and in day-to-day life. She expressed these themes through large pastel drawings and photographic collages. After gaining recognition in the 1980s as part of the Black British Artists Movement, Boyce’s practice has evolved to become more collaborative and site specific, integrating mediums including film, performance, photography and installation.
Her recent work collaboratively brings the audience into sharper focus as an integral part of the artwork, between artist, vocalists and audience, demonstrating how cultural differences might be articulated, mediated and enjoyed. Boyce’s significant exhibitions include Five Black Women, African Centre, London (1983); Sonia Boyce: For you, only you, Magdalen College, Oxford and subsequent UK venues (2007 – 2008); and All the World’s Futures, 56th Venice Biennale, Arsenale and Giardini (2015). She is represented in the permanent collections of Arts Council England and Tate Modern, London.
In 2007, Boyce was awarded an OBE for services to art and she became a Royal Academician in 2016. She has exhibited at the ICA London, Eastside Projects in Birmingham and Venice Biennale. In 2016, Boyce was awarded the Paul Hamlyn Foundation Award for Artists.
This year she has been selected to represent Britain at the Venice Biennale, 2022.
She is currently Professor of Black Art and Design at University of the Arts London and a former Professor of Fine Arts at Middlesex University, London.