Lisa Reihana was born in 1964 of Nga Puhi descent. She graduated with a Bachelor of Fine Arts from Elam School of Fine Arts at Auckland University in 1987 and a Masters of Design from Unitec Institute of Technology in 2014.
She is a multi disciplinary artist and her practice spans film, costume, sculpture, costume and body adornment , text and photography. She explores colonisation, gender and representations of Indigenous people across media.
She has earned an outstanding reputation for an extensive body of work most notably “In Pursuit of Venus (Infected)”. This is a large scale video installation – six years in the making- that she exhibited at the 57th Venice Biennale as New Zealand’s representative. This has become an internationally acclaimed work and continues to be exhibited extensively.
In 2014 Lisa received an Arts Laureate Award and in 2018 New Year Honours she was appointed a Member of the New Zealand Order of Merit for services to art.
Lisa was recently commissioned to make a monumental moving image work “Ground Loop” for the central Atrium of the new Sydney Modern art gallery. Set between Aotearoa and Australia this is a sci-fi story of trans-Tasman connection.
