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EJ Hill

He // Him // His

Artist, Musician, and Educator

Los Angeles, California

A solid, soft pink square that touches all four sides of the image frame.

Photo courtesy of the artist and Whitney Museum of American Art, New York.

In my work as an artist, I have witnessed firsthand how a handful of dedicated visionaries are able to band together, source materials, create something new, and then offer it up into the world.”

EJ Hill is an artist born, raised, and based in South Central, Los Angeles. Hill’s practice focuses largely on challenging the social aspects and systems that construct a body. He is not only interested in how bodies and subjectivities are formed, understood, and valued within different social and cultural contexts, but also how they redefine the parameters that govern which of them are allowed to exist freely.

Hill received an MFA from the University of California, Los Angeles in 2013 and a BFA from Columbia College Chicago in 2011. His work has been exhibited at the Hammer Museum; the Studio Museum in Harlem; the Whitney Museum of American Art; MASS MoCA; Los Angeles County Museum of Art; the Aspen Art Museum; PinchukArtCentre, Kyiv, Ukraine; and Institut d’art Contemporain, Villeurbanne/Rhône-Alpes, France.

He is a recipient of awards and fellowships from the Radcliffe Institute for Advanced Study at Harvard University, the Durfee Foundation’s Stanton Fellowship, Joan Mitchell Foundation’s Painters & Sculptors Grant, the Artadia Los Angeles Award, a Foundation for Contemporary Arts artist grant, and a grant from the Art Matters Foundation.

Much of what he knows he has learned from: Estelle Thompson, Karen Thompson, Ernest Hill Jr., Margaret Nomentana, Joan Giroux, Adam Brooks and Mat Wilson (Industry of the Ordinary), Andrea Fraser, Mario Ybarra Jr., Matt Austin, Young Chung, Adam Feldmeth, Jordan Casteel, TLC, Lauryn Hill, and Augie Grahn. Hill is forever indebted to these educators and thanks them endlessly.

Donor -This award was generously supported by The Todd and Betiana Simon Foundation.

This artist page was last updated on: 08.18.2024

A sculpture resembling the framework of a small, yellow Ferris wheel that has been halved into a semicircle, giving the illusion that half of the ride has been swallowed up by the green lawn below. All of the Ferris wheel’s carriages have been removed except for one at the very top of the ride.

Rises in the East by EJ Hill, 2021. Fiberglass and marine-coated steel, 564 × 1128 × 108 inches. Prospect.5 New Orleans.

Photo by Alex Marks.

A sculpture placed inside a large gallery space that resembles a roller coaster. The thin, pink track curves and ripples around the spacious modern interior, upheld by wooden frames. In the foreground sits the roller coaster car, a modest two-seater painted teal.

Brava! by EJ Hill and Skyline Attractions, 2022. Weld-free steel roller coaster, enamel spray paint, wood, and velvet. Massachusetts Museum of Contemporary Art (MASS MoCA).

Photo by Kaelan Burkett.

A windowless interior that resembles an outdoor track arena with wooden hurdles that are absurdly tall. The walls curve upward toward the ceiling and are painted a sky blue. In the center of the track is a three-tiered platform with a person with brown skin standing on the tallest tier. They stand erect dressed in black with a passive expression. Behind the figure is text written in neon lighting.

Excellentia, Mollitia, Victoria by EJ Hill, 2018. Installation and durational performance, dimensions variable. Made in L.A. 2018, Hammer Museum.

Photo by Brian Forrest.