Sula Bermudez-Silverman
Sula Bermudez-Silverman (b. 1993, New York) received her BA in Studio Art from Bard College and her MFA in Sculpture from the Yale School of Art. Bermudez-Silverman’s sculptural practice is guided by the contextual origins and contemporary trajectories of her materials. With intensive research, she delves into mythological and historical narratives to examine their imprint. Materials such as sugar, salt, glass, and resin often serve as physical homonyms, altering motifs such as the “ball and claw” through color, scale, and translucency. Bermudez-Silverman also uses contained forms like peepholes, cast in uranium or tinted glass, as a quarantine for the cultural lore surrounding microscopic viruses, patriotic lions, or insect-affected trade routes. By using rare earth minerals, the glass peepholes change colour depending on their display lighting. This kind of aesthetic shift works to acknowledge the mining history and desirability of each element. Throughout the entirety of Bermudez-Silverman’s catalog, objects that operate as a physical threshold - windows, saddles, staircases - are reintroduced to connect disparate epistemologies and question how history is camouflaged into the subconscious.
Education
2018 MFA in Sculpture, Yale School of Art, New Haven, CT
2015 BA in Studio Art, Bard College, Annandale-on-Hudson, NY
2013 Central Saint Martin’s School of Art & Design, London, England
Solo Exhibitions
2025
mole mold molt, Hannah Hoffman, Los Angeles
2023
Bad Luck Rock, Josh Lilley, London
Ichthyocentaur, Matthew Brown, Los Angles
2022
Here Be Dragons, Micki Meng, San Francisco
2021
Sighs and Leers and Crocodile Tears, Murmurs, Los Angeles
2020
Neither Fish, Flesh, nor Fowl, California African American Art Museum, Los Angeles
2018
Sutures, University of Texas at Austin, Austin
2015
Reconstruction, Project Row Houses, Houston
Group Exhibitions
2025
Ode to ’Dena: Black Artistic Legacies of Altadena, California African American Museum, Los Angeles
Paranoid Style, Josh Lilley, London
The Intimacies Between Continents, Contemporary Arts Center Gallery, UC Irvine, Irvine
2024
Thresholds, Wolford House, Los Angeles
Objects for a Heavenly Cave, Marta, Los Angeles
Overflow, Afterglow: New Work in Chromatic Figuration, Jewish Museum, New York
Lavinia, Hannah Hoffman, Los Angeles
2023
Mickalene Thomas / Portrait of an Unlikely Space, Yale University Art Gallery, New Haven
Made in LA 2023: Acts of Living, Hammer Museum, Los Angeles
0 Horizon, Sturt Haaga Gallery, Descanso Gardens, Los Angeles
Piano, Piano, Et al., San Francisco
I’ve Gone to Look for America, Murmurs, Los Angeles
Something or Other, Curated by Isabel Yellin, Galerie Maria Bernheim, Zurich, Switzerland
2022
Fabric of a Nation: American Quilt Stories, Skirball Cultural Center, Los Angeles
Hot Concrete: LA to HK, K11 Musea, Hong Kong
Nightmare Bathroom, Del Vaz Projects, Los Angeles
Press Release, Storage, New York
Signals, Someday, New York
Many, Craft Contemporary, Los Angeles
Incognito LA, ICA Los Angeles, Los Angeles
Doing Our Own Thing, Japanese American Cultural Community Center, Los Angeles
Gum:Scale, Jack Chiles Gallery, New York
Recent Sculpture, Matthew Brown, Los Angeles
Pas le temps de tout détruire sans doute, Sans Titre, Paris
Imago Ignota, Fortnight Institute, New York
Room with a View, Sow & Tailor, Los Angeles
2021
Contramundos, Lodos, Mexico City, Mexico
Feminist Center for Creative Work Auction, Artsy
Enfolding Bloom, Galerie Dengyun, Shanghai, China
Expanded Field, Ochi Aux, Los Angeles
Giving Up the Ghost, Sow & Tailor, Los Angeles
Here We Are In Croydon, Josh Lilley, London
Shining in the Low Tide, Unclebrother, Hancock
Desire Encapsulated, Make Room, Los Angeles
Ring Down the Curtain, Ochi Projects, Los Angeles
2020
Baker’s Dozen, Torrance Art Museum, Torrance
2019
Technotihuacan, Failed Films Fest, Los Angeles
Technotihuacan, Outsider Fest, Austin
2018
Technotihuacan, SOMArts, San Francisco
Table for Eleggua, Table for Elijah, Yale MFA Thesis Twenty Ears, New Haven
2017
Odds and Ends Art Book Fair, Yale University Art Gallery, New Haven
Litter Mates, Liar’s Lair, New Haven
Say-So, EIK Gallery, New Haven
Rumba Rumba, Kimba Hills Gallery, Santa Monica
19 Things You Won’t Believe You Didn’t Know, Los Angeles
2016
Black Joy, Yale University, New Haven
Unsafe Colors, Studio 106, Santa Monica
Lost Wax, As It Stands, Los Angeles
Stone Palace, Stone Palace, Los Angeles
2015
Home Body, UBS Bard College Exhibition Center, Red Hook
2014
Plan View: Four Cities, Arts Society of Kingston, Kingston
Artist’s Books and Cookies, Ooga Twooga, Los Angeles
Junior Prom, Atwater Gallery, Rhinebeck
Press
CV
Exhibitions
Paranoid Style
Group Show
Altar States
Group Show
Bad Luck Rock
Solo Show