Emily Barker | |
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Born | 1992 (age 31–32) San Diego, California, U.S. |
Education | School of the Art Institute of Chicago |
Occupation | Multidisciplinary artist |
Known for | Disability advocate |
Emily Barker (born 1992) is an American multidisciplinary artist and activist based in Los Angeles.[1][2][3] Their work focuses on topics related to disability, discrimination, and capitalism.[4]
Emily Barker was born in 1992 in San Diego, California, and grew up in the state of Georgia.[3][5] Barker uses the pronouns they/them.[6] They studied at the School of the Art Institute of Chicago (SAIC).[7] Barker is a wheelchair user and chronically ill, she had an accident and was diagnosed as paraplegia at age 19 and with complex regional pain syndrome at age 20.[7][3] In addition to making art, Barker has worked as a fashion model.[1]
Barker's work examines and challenges ableism embedded into contemporary society.[8][7]
In 2020, Murmurs, an art space in Los Angeles, California, presented Barker's first solo show titled Built to Scale.[9][10] Barker participated in the 2022 Whitney Biennial titled "Quiet as It's Kept" curated by Adrienne Edwards and David Breslin.[11] Her work in the 2022 Whitney Biennial was the only work explicitly about the topic of disability.[12]