Stephen Prina

Born in 1954 in Galesburg, IL

Lives and works in Cambridge, MA and Los Angeles, CA

Stephen Prina’s oeuvre is diverse, including installation, painting, sculpture, film and musical performance. Through these various mediums, Prina examines the cultural production and consumption process by making pre-existing works of art his regular points of departure. Without discarding their original meaning, Prina re-arranges and re-presents ideas to bring new possible signification to the fore.

This deconstructive approach, which poses questions around authenticity, authorship and originality, has led his practice to be described as “post-conceptualist”. His autonomous but yet thematically related bodies of work form a continuous series, in which elements often get revisited over the course of his career. Prina’s re-contextualisation forms a framework of references that merge history with the contemporary, deftly drawing connections and challenging assumptions about representation and the role of art objects.

The first in-depth exhibition focusing on Prina's performances will open at MoMA, New York in September 2025. Prina has has had numerous solo exhibitions worldwide at JUBG, Cologne (2023); Museo Tamayo, Mexico City (2020); Petzel Gallery, New York (2019); Museo Madre, Naples (2017); Museum Kurhaus Kleve (2016); Kunst Halle Sankt Gallen (2015) Secession, Vienna (2011); Los Angeles County Museum of Art (2013); Palais de Tokyo, Paris (2013); Galerie Gisela Capitain, Cologne (2014); Contemporary Art Museum St. Louis (2010); Bergen Kunsthall, (2009); Staatliche Kunsthalle Baden-Baden (2008); The Art Institute of Chicago (2002); Kunsthalle Basel (2002); Frankfurter Kunstverein, Frankfurt am Main (2000) among many others. His work has also been extensively shown in group shows, such as at the Familienbande, Museum Ludwig, Cologne (2019); MUMOK, Vienna (2018); Institute of Contemporary Art, Los Angeles (2018); Museum Brandhorst, Munich (2016); Museum Ludwig, Vienna (2015); Hammer Museum, Los Angeles (2014); Centre Pompidou, Paris (2014); Contemporary Arts Museum Houston, Houston (2013); Whitney Museum of American Art, New York (2008); The J. Paul Getty Museum, Los Angeles (2000). 

Stephen Prina has also participated at the Whitney Biennale in 2008, documenta IX in 1992, the Venice Biennale in 1990.

Prina’s work is held in the collections of the Albright Knox Art Gallery, Buffalo; Carnegie Museum of Art, Pittsburgh; Centro Andaluz de Arte Contemporáneo, Sevilla; Center for Curatorial Studies, Bard, Hudson, New York; Hammer Museum, Los Angeles; Los Angeles County Museum of Contemporary Art, Los Angeles; Mamco, Musée d'Art Moderne et Contemporain, Geneva; Museum Boijmans-van Beuningen, Rotterdam; Museum of Contemporary Art, Los Angeles; Museum of Contemporary Art, Chicago Museum of Modern Art, New York; Museum Moderner Kunst Stiftung Ludwing, Vienna; Museum Ludwig, Cologne; Tate, London; Vancouver Art Gallery, Vancouver; Whitney Museum of American Art, New York.