Laylah Ali headshot

Laylah Ali

b. 1968 in Buffalo, NY / based in Williamstown, MA

Laylah Ali’s exacting process and rigorous line, coupled with her signature two-dimensional, fantastical figures, define the Buffalo-born artist’s first collaboration at Tamarind Institute. At turns amusing and strange, Ali’s highly personal bodies are puzzles of personality and form, and often contain several references to our current and historical political landscapes; the complexities and issues surrounding race, diaspora and gender; and the artist’s inner psyche.

Laylah Ali earned her BFA from Williams College in 1991 and her MFA from Washington University in 1994. Her work has been shown in the Venice Biennale (2003), and the Whitney Biennial (2004), was the subject of a major touring exhibition in 2012–2013 that originated at the Williams College Museum of Art, and can be found in the permanent collections of the Albright-Knox Art Gallery, Buffalo, NY; the Museum of Contemporary Art Chicago, IL; the Museum of Modern Art, New York, NY; and the Walker Art Center, Minneapolis, MN, among many others. She is currently based in Massachusetts. Her solo show “Is anything the matter? Drawings by Laylah Ali” is currently on view at University Museum of Contemporary Art at UMass, Amherst, and then will travel to Colby College Museum of Art in the fall of 2025.

Artist’s Website

Printed and Published by Tamarind

News and Press

Is anything the matter? Drawings by Laylah Ali
University Museum of Contemporary Art, UMass, February 14–May 9, 2025

Art in the Twenty-First Century, Season 3, “Power”
Art21, September 16, 2005

Laylah Ali, 303 Gallery
Artforum, October 2000