Tamar Ettun

Tamar Ettun (she/they) creates immersive textile installations, sculptures, drawings, videos, and performances that reflect on somatic empathy — the process of responding to others through sensory-based, embodied experiences — in relation to trauma-healing and ritual. She has exhibited and performed at The Walker Art Center, Pioneer Works, The Chinati Foundation, The Shelburne Museum, Marjorie Barrick Museum of Art, The Watermill Center, Art Omi Sculpture Garden, PERFORMA, Socrates Sculpture Park, The Jewish Museum, and Sculpture Center.

Ettun received many awards and fellowships, including support from The Pollock Krasner Foundation, Interlude Artist Residency, Fountainhead, Moca Tucson, Stoneleaf Retreat, MacDowell Fellowship, Franklin Furnace, Iaspis, Art Production Fund, Lower Manhattan Cultural Council, Triangle Arts Association, Abrons Art Center and RECESS.

Ettun's recent monumental sculpture, Purple Placenta, was commissioned by the Ford Foundation for the exhibition Catando Bajito: Incantations, which examines forms of resistance in response to widespread violations of bodily autonomy and gender-based violence.

Ettun holds an M.F.A. in Sculpture from Yale University.

Academic Research/Specialty Areas

  • Interdisciplinary art
  • Performance art
  • Sculpture
  • Ritual
  • The body
  • Demons
  • Somatic empathy
  • Motherhood
  • Reproductive justice

Related News

Classes (Selected)

Awards, Grants, and Fellowships (Selected)

  • The California Studio, Manetti-Shrem Artist Residencies at UC Davis (2021)
  • The Chinati Foundation (2020)
  • The Watermill Center Residency (2020, 2015)
  • Pioneer Works Artist Residency (2019)
  • The Pollock Krasner Foundation Grant (2014)

Exhibitions and Presentations (Selected)

  • Catando Bajito: Incantations, The Ford Foundation, curated by Roxana Fabius, Kobe Ko, and Beya Othmani, New York, NY (2024)
  • Lilit's Umbilical Cord (site-specific installation taking over five-stories staircase and roof), New York Art Book Fair presented by Printed Matter and Dreamsong, Dia Art Foundation (2024)
  • Dead Sea (performance installation), curated by David Everritt Howe, Pioneer Works, Brooklyn (2019)

Publications (Selected)

  • Vogel, Wendy. Great Women Sculptors. Edited by Maia Murphy. Phaidon Press, 2024.
  • Lewis, Jurrell. In the Studio with Tamar Ettun. Art21, 2024.
  • Workman, Elisabeth. "Demon Bloomsongs: Tamar Ettun's Vivid Somatics." MN Artists, The Walker Art Center, 2023.

Selected Work

  • A yellow fabric dome with a purple interior and a thick fabric band extending to the ceiling

    Purple Placenta (2024), site-specific installation, installation view at The Ford Foundation. image / provided

  • A group of people gathered in a circle with their arms raised, and colorful fabric hangings in the background.

    Lilit (2023), performance, installation view at The Armory Show, traveled from The Walker Art Center. image / provided

  • A pink and orange fabric sculpture with two claw-like extensions connected to a bust of a person.

    Doreen: The Creatures (2018), sculpture with motion sensors activating lights and sounds. image / provided

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