Shannon T. Lewis

Shannon T. Lewis  (b. 1981 in Toronto, Canada; lives and works in Berlin, Germany)  is an artist of Caribbean descent reconfiguring human forms and the spaces they inhabit within her complex and vivid paintings. Lewis begins with assemblage — the forefront of her practice — utilizing fragments of form and space. Particularly inspired by cultural social cues, whimsical aspects in the work evoke a sense of freedom from social confines and examine marginalized identities within those spaces. 

The use of architecture is a recurring element, oftentimes inspired by ornate iconography. Painted and interlaced limbs reconnoiter the history of femininity and its relation to Blackness. Lewis offers a window into freedom and body politics as the paintings explore figures in surreal landscapes, shifting between two-dimensional and three-dimensional spaces. Her works act as painted collage, expanding our understanding of location and placement through her layered compositions. Haunting portraits derived from archival and personal sources, Lewis imbues the past and present to construct a utopian future.

Lewis earned her Masters of Fine Arts from Goldsmiths, University of London (London, UK), following her Bachelors of Arts from Ontario College of Art & Design (Toronto, Canada). She has exhibited at the Joan Mitchell Foundation (New Orleans, LA), Asian Arts Initiative (Philadelphia, PA), Para Foundation (Berlin, Germany), xpace Cultural Centre (Toronto, Canada), and Kunstmuseum Wolfsburg (Wulfsburg, Germany), among others, as well as with Mariane Ibrahim in Paris, Chicago, and Mexico City. In 2023 she had a solo exhibition at The FLAG Art Foundation (New York, NY). 

Her work is collected by CCH Pounder Collection (New Orleans, LA), The Dean Collection (New York, NY), and The FLAG Art Foundation (New York, NY). In 2025, Lewis was invited as a guest professor for the fall semester at the Universität der Künste (Berlin, Germany) to teach the painting course Dramaturgy of the Object in the Bühnebild department.