"Photography has a way of keeping people alive"
A pioneering voice in photography for more than four decades, Flash’s multifaceted practice has evolved through numerous series, each with a unique formal and conceptual focus. Beginning with their iconic “Cross Colour” series from the 1980s and 1990s—which utilized inverted colors to document queer culture as part of ACT UP, in the wake of the HIV/AIDS epidemic—this exhibition traces a path through portraiture towards recent and ongoing series. Working at the forefront of genderqueer visual politics, all of Flash’s work challenges preconceptions about gender and racism, and is firmly rooted in social justice advocacy for marginalized peoples.
Lola Flash (b. 1959, Montclair, NJ) has works in museums including the Museum of Modern Art, New York; Whitney Museum of American Art, New York; Brooklyn Museum; National Museum of African American History & Culture, Washington D.C.; Virginia Museum of Fine Arts, Richmond; the J. Paul Getty Museum, Los Angeles; and Victoria and Albert Museum, London. Work is currently on view in MoMA as part of their permanent collection. Recent exhibitions have included Queer Lens: A History of Photography, at the J. Paul Getty Museum, Los Angeles, 2025; Trust Me, at the Whitney, New York, 2024; and Lola Flash: SALT, What If Women Ruled the World? Part II, a solo at the National Museum of Contemporary Art, Athens, Greece, 2024.
Flash is a proud current member of Kamoinge, and is the President of the board of Queer Art. Flash is recipient of awards including the Visual AIDS Vanguard Award, 2024; a Pollock-Krasner Foundation Award, 2024; and two Art Matters Grants, 2021 and 2011. Flash holds a BA in Photography from the Maryland Institute College of Arts, Baltimore, and an MA in Photography from London College of Printing, London, UK. Flash lives and works in New York.
