La Toya Ruby Frazier was born in 1982, in Braddock, Pennsylvania, received her B.F.A. in applied media arts from Edinboro University of Pennsylvania (2004) and her M.F.A. in art photography from Syracuse University (2007). She also studied under the Whitney Museum of American Art Independent Study Program (2010–2011) and was the Guna S. Mundheim Fellow for visual arts at the American Academy in Berlin (2013–2014). In 2014, Frazier accepted the assistant professor of photography position at the School of the Art Institute of Chicago. She has previously held academic and curatorial positions at Yale University School of Art, Rutgers University, and Syracuse University. Frazier lectures prolifically at academic and cultural institutions such as the Interna- tional Center of Photography; Columbia University School of the Arts; Parsons the New School; Pratt Institute; Cooper Union; Tisch School of Arts, New York University; and the School of Visual Arts, all in New York City; Freie Universitat Berlin, Dahlem Humanities Center and Hamburger Bahnhof; and Tate Modern, London. Frazier’s work is exhibited widely in the U.S. and internationally, with notable solo exhibitions at Brooklyn Museum; Seattle Art Museum; Institute of Contemporary Art, Boston; and Contemporary Arts Museum Houston. Her work has also been featured in the following group shows: The Generational Triennial: Younger Than Jesus (2009), New Museum, New York; Greater New York (2010), MoMA PS1, New York; Commercial Break, Garage Projects (2011), 54th Venice Biennale; Gertrude’s/ LOT (2011), Andy Warhol Museum, Pittsburgh; Empire State (2013), Palazzo delle Esposizinoi, Rome; and The Way Of The Shovel: Art as Archaeology (2013), Museum of Contemporary Art, Chicago, among many others Her work has been exhibited in the following biennials: the Whitney Museum of American Art Biennial (2012), New York, Recycling Memory: Recapturing the Lost City (2014), 11th Nicaraguan Visual Arts Biennial, Managua; Mom, am I barbarian? (2013),13th Istanbul Biennial; and Busan Biennale (2014), South Korea. Frazier is the recipient of many awards, including a fellowship from the John Simon Guggenheim Memorial Foundation (2014), Gwendolyn Knight and Jacob Lawrence Prize of the Seattle Art Museum (2013), the Theo Westenberger Award of the Creative Capital Foundation (2012), the Louis Comfort Tiffany Foundation Award (2011), and Art Matters (2010) Her work can be found in public and private art collections such as the Brooklyn Museum; Carnegie Museum, Pittsburgh; Centre National Des Arts Plastiques, France; JP Morgan Chase Collection, Library of Congress, Washington, D.C.; Museum of Contemporary Art, Chicago; Museum of Contemporary Photography, Columbia College, Chicago; Nacher Museum at Duke University, Durham, N.C.; Spelman College Museum of Fine Art, Atlanta; Whitney Museum of American Art, New York; Zabludowicz Collection, London, and Pomeranz Collection, Vienna, among others.

Atlanta Contemporary is a participating institution in Pledges of Allegiance, a nationwide, year-long public art project featuring a serialized commission of flags created by acclaimed artists and presented by New York-based public art nonprofit Creative Time. Conceived in response to the current political climate, Pledges of Allegiance aims to inspire a sense of community among cultural institutions, and begin articulating the urgent response our political moment demands.

Creative Time, the New York based public arts non-profit, is committed to working with artists on the dialogues, debates, and dreams of our time. Creative Time presents the most innovative art in the public realm, providing new platforms to amplify the voices of artists, including the Creative Time Summit — an international conference convening at the intersection of art and social justice.Since 1974, Creative Time has produced over 350 groundbreaking public art projects that ignite the imagination, explore ideas that shape society, and engage millions of people around the globe. The non-profit that since its inception has been at the forefront of socially engaged public art seeks to convert the power of artists’ ideas into works that inspire and challenge the public. Creative Time projects stimulate dialogue on timely issues, and initiate a dynamic experience between artists, sites, and audiences. To promote the project via social media use #PledgesofAllegiance and tag @CreativeTimeNYC (Instagram) & @CreativeTime (Twitter)