Lava Thomas is a nationally recognized artist whose work has been exhibited in museums, galleries and academic venues across the country, including the Smithsonian American Art Museum and the National Portrait Gallery, Washington, D.C.; the International Print Center, New York, NY; the Montgomery Museum of Fine Arts, Montgomery, AL; the Museum of the African Diaspora, San Francisco, CA; Spelman College Museum of Fine Art, Atlanta, GA; the Contemporary Jewish Museum, San Francisco, CA; and the California African American Museum, Los Angeles, CA, among others. Her work is held in the permanent collections of the United States Consulate General in Johannesburg, South Africa; the Smithsonian American Art Museum, Washington, DC; the Smithsonian National Museum of African American History and Culture, Washington, DC; the San Francisco Museum of Modern Art; the Studio Museum in Harlem, New York, NY; the Pennsylvania Academy of Fine Arts, Philadelphia, PA; the M.H. de Young Museum, San Francisco, CA; the Cantor Art Center at Stanford University, Stanford, CA, and the Berkeley Art Museum & Pacific Film Archive in Berkeley, CA. Thomas's work has been written about in Artforum, The New York Times, The Los Angeles Times, Hyperallergic, SF Chronicle, The Guardian, KQED Arts, The Art Newspaper, and LA Weekly.Lava Thomas tackles issues of race, gender, representation and memorialization through a multidisciplinary practice that spans drawing, painting, photography, sculpture, and site-specific installations. Drawing from her family’s Southern roots, current and historical socio-political events, intersectional feminism and African American protest and devotional traditions, Thomas’s practice centers ideas that amplify visibility, healing, and empowerment in the face of erasure, trauma and oppression.www.lavathomas.comThomas is represented by Rena Bransten Gallery in San Francisco.