Jamaica-born artist Nari Ward will create a dramatic sculpture for a vacant lot recently converted in to Ride It Sculpture Park. In conjunction with Power House Productions, the Joyce Award will allow Ward to spend nearly a year in Detroit to gain inspiration and source local materials to create a beacon of art in the most unexpected of places.
Ward’s dramatic sculptural installations are composed of systematically collected material from his urban neighborhood. By revealing the numerous emotions inherent within found everyday objects, Wardʼs works examine issues surrounding race, poverty, and consumer culture.
Wardʼs work has appeared in venues worldwide including MASS MOCA, Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum, the Walker Art Center; and has taken part in important group exhibitions, including the Whitney Biennale (2006); Prospect 1 New Orleans (2008); and Documenta XI, Kassel (2003). Wardʼs works is collected by numerous museums, including the Museum of Modern Art, New York; Baltimore Museum of Art, Maryland; Brooklyn Museum, New York; Nasher Museum of Art at Duke University, North Carolina; Studio Museum, Harlem; Walker Art Center, Minneapolis; and Whitney Museum, New York.Additionally, he has received prestigious commissions from the United Nations and the World Health Organization, and awards from the American Academy of Arts and Letters, the National Endowment for the Arts, New York Foundation for the Arts, John Simon Guggenheim Foundation, and the Pollock Krasner Foundation.