Born to artists Betye and Richard Saar in 1956, Alison Saar was exposed to the visual arts from an early age. As a practicing artist in the 1980s, Saar often experimented with sculpture and mixed media. Her residency at the Studio Museum in Harlem in 1983 provided Saar the opportunity to expand her practice as she came to incorporate found material into her installations, assemblages, and sculptures. Influenced by her personal and cultural identity, Saar’s work often explores her experiences as a Black woman living in America and African diasporic themes.
In 1987, Alison Saar became an Artist-in-Residence at The Fabric Workshop and Museum, just a few years after her mother Betye completed her own residency here (1984). At FWM, Saar collaborated with the Studio team to experiment with prints on textiles such as silk and linen. Her residency resulted in two works: a scarf, Hair Story, which explored a range of black hairstyles through a combination of image and text in a grid depicting hairstyle portraits (such as “Flat Top” and “Ronette”) and hair products (“Afro Pick” and “Hot Comb”); and a napkin, Saints and Sinners, depicting a woman praying with clouds above her.
Since her time at FWM, Saar has continued her illustrious career with numerous exhibitions across the United States. Her public works include a major commission Swing Low, a 2008 two-ton statue depicting abolitionist Harriet Tubman that became the first public monument to an African American woman in New York City.
