The Hammer Museum in Los Angeles has announced the 27 artists featured in the upcoming seventh iteration of its Made in L.A. biennial, curated by Essence Harden and Paulina Pobocha. The biennial is slated to open at the beginning of October and will be on view through early January 2026.
A complete list of artists included appears at the end of this article.
Commanding both local and international attention to the artists of the greater Los Angeles area, Made in L.A. presents the region’s creative lifeblood across generations and a variety of media. According to the museum, this edition’s featured artists push the boundaries of painting, cast light on sculptural innovation, engage with experimental film and video art as well as theater and choreography, and examine community-building through architecture and domesticity.
Of the cohort of 27 participating artists, 11 of them were born in the 1980s and six were born in the 1990s, with Iraqi artist Ali Eyal listed as the youngest. On the other hand, experimental filmmaker Pat O’Neill was born in 1939, followed by Carl Cheng, born in 1942.
“LA has been my home and center of my practice for over 50 years; it is and always has been a hub for future-thinking creators,” Cheng said in an email to Hyperallergic. “I am honored to have my sculptural work placed within a larger conversation with so many great artists in the region.”
Harden, formerly a curator at the California African American Museum, organized the Focus section for Frieze LA 2024 and 2025. Pobocha was recently appointed chair and curator of Modern and Contemporary Art at the Art Institute of Chicago after serving as the Hammer Museum’s senior curator for a year.
“From the outset of this process, our primary objective was to look at art, and to see as much of it as possible,” the pair said in a joint statement.
“While there are as many ideas circulating through the show as there are materials, an inquiry into one’s relationship to the city of Los Angeles animates much of the work we will present,” Harden and Pobocha continued. “Neither myth nor monolith, this city is many things to many people, and its cacophonous disorder is, perhaps, its most distinguishing feature.”
The museum has yet to announce a theme or title for this year’s biennial. The 2023 edition, titled Acts of Living and curated by Diana Nawi and Pablo José Ramírez, featured 39 artists.
The announcement comes at a difficult time for Los Angeles, when local artists, galleries, and organizations are calling on the art world’s support. The Palisades and Eaton fires devastated parts of the region earlier this month, leaving thousands displaced and generations of artistic and cultural heritage burnt to ashes.
“Los Angeles is still grappling with the terrible fires of the last few weeks, but as we look ahead to the fall, I hope this biennial can demonstrate the resilience of artists and this city,” Hammer Museum Director Zoë Ryan said in a statement.
The 27 artists in the upcoming edition of Made in L.A. are as follows:
David Alekhuogie
(b. 1986, Los Angeles)
Black House Radio / Michael Donte
(est. 2023)
Greg Breda
(b. 1959, Los Angeles)
Widline Cadet
(b. 1992, Pétion-Ville, Ayiti, Haiti)
Carl Cheng
(b. 1942, San Francisco)
Jerald “Coop” Cooper
(b. 1983, Cincinnati)
Ali Eyal
(b. 1994, Baghdad, Iraq)
Hanna Hur
(b. 1985, Toronto)
John Knight
(b. 1945, Los Angeles)
Kristy Luck
(b. 1985, Woodstock, IL)
Patrick Martinez
(b. 1980, Pasadena)
Beaux Mendes
(b. 1987, New York)
Na Mira
(b. 1982, Lawrence, KS)
New Theater Hollywood / Max Pitegoff and Calla Henkel
(est. 2024)
Pat O’Neill
(b. 1939, Los Angeles)
Will Rawls
(b. 1978, Boston)
Brian Rochefort
(b. 1985, Lincoln, NE)
Amanda Ross-Ho
(b. 1975, Chicago)
Gabriela Ruiz
(b. 1991, San Fernando Valley)
Alake Shilling
(b. 1993, Los Angeles)
Nicole-Antonia Spagnola
(b. 1991, Los Angeles)
Mike Stoltz
(b. 1981, Miami)
Peter Tomka
(b. 1989, Des Moines)
Freddy Villalobos
(b. 1989, Los Angeles)
Kelly Wall
(b. 1990, Los Angeles)
Leilah Weinraub
(b. 1979, Los Angeles)
Bruce Yonemoto
(b. 1949, San Jose)
