Artist Biography
Pae White (b. 1963, Pasadena, United States, based in Los Angeles, United States) works across sculpture, painting, installation and graphic design to explore the overlooked and ephemeral qualities of everyday life. Using common materials such as yarn, paper, birdseed and glass, her practice blurs the traditional boundaries between fine and applied arts, subverting perceptions of familiar objects, processes and spaces.
Since 2006, White has employed contemporary technology to create large-scale tapestries that monumentalise images of mundane, transient moments such as crumpled foil, smoke plumes and fluttering insects. In other works, her experimentation with thread has expanded to include immersive installations of supergraphic letterforms that criss-cross between walls, such as in Too Much Night, Again (2013). These works create three-dimensional arrangements for viewers to navigate visually and physically. Cascading, hanging mobile pieces are another key aspect of White’s practice. Alluding to forms in the natural world like schools of fish, flocks of birds and drifting clouds, these suspended flurries of colour sway gently mid-air, providing a moment of pause and contemplation within the exhibition space.
White obtained her BA from Scripps College, Claremont in 1985 and her MFA from Art Center College of Design, Pasadena in 1991. Her work is found in major collections including the Art Institute of Chicago; Hammer Museum, Los Angeles; Kölnisches Stadtmuseum, Köln; Los Angeles County Museum of Art, Los Angeles; Museum of Contemporary Art, Los Angeles; Museum of Modern Art, New York; Museum of Contemporary Art, San Diego; San Francisco Museum of Modern Art; Stedelijk Museum, Amsterdam; Tate Modern, London; and National Gallery of Victoria, Melbourne.
Notable solo exhibitions include bugs, drugs, a crab and maybe, some…rain (2022), Kunstverein, Jesteburg; Beta Space (2019), San Jose Museum of Art; Command-Shift-4 (2015), Henry Art Gallery, University of Washington, Seattle; O R L L E G R O (2013), Museum of Applied Arts, Vienna; Restless Rainbow (2011), The Art Institute of Chicago; Material Mutters (2010), The Power Plant Contemporary Art Gallery, Toronto; Dying Oak/Elephant (2010), St Louis Art Museum; and Pae White (2004), Hammer Museum, Los Angeles. The artist has also participated in major international festivals including 1st NGV Triennial (2017), Melbourne; Weaving & We (2016), 2nd Hangzhou Triennial of Fibre Art; Between a Rock and a Hard Place (2011), 3rd Thessaloniki Biennale of Contemporary Art; 2010 (2010), 1st Whitney Biennial, New York; Making Worlds (2009), 53rd Venice Biennale; and HyperDesign (2006), 6th Shanghai Biennale.
White had her residency at the STPI Workshop in 2017, resulting in the exhibition Friendship is Magic (2021). She was also part of the group exhibition New Releases, Old Friends: Angela Bulloch, Richard Deacon, Janice Kerbel, Tobias Rehberger and Pae White (2025).