ABOUT SONIA BOYCE

Sonia Boyce OBE RA is a British Afro-Caribbean artist who grew up in Plaistow and went to school in Canning Town. Over her 30-year career, Boyce has emerged as one of the leading figures in the British art scene.

Boyce’s concept for the Newham Trackside Wall was selected from a shortlist of three artists’ proposals in September 2017, by a steering panel of project and community representatives. The panel took into account feedback from residents gathered at a series of exhibitions across the different neighborhoods of the borough of Newham.

Boyce studied at Stourbridge College, West Midlands. Her early work addressed issues of race and gender in the media and in day-to-day life. She expressed these themes through large pastel drawings and photographic collages. After gaining recognition in the 1980s as part of the Black British Artists Movement, Boyce’s practice evolved to become more collaborative and site specific, bringing the audience into sharper focus as an integral part of the artwork.

In 2007, Boyce was awarded an OBE for services to art and became a Royal Academician in 2016. She has exhibited at the ICA London, Manchester Art Gallery, Eastside Projects in Birmingham and La Biennale di Venezia and is represented in the permanent collections of Arts Council England and Tate Modern, London. In 2016, Boyce was awarded the Paul Hamlyn Foundation Award for Artists.

Boyce has been commissioned by the British Council to represent Great Britain at the 59th International Art Exhibition – La Biennale di Venezia in 2022. She is currently Professor of Black Art and Design at University of the Arts London and a former Professor of Fine Arts at Middlesex University, London.