Barbara Bloom is a conceptual artist best known for her multimedia installation works which construct visual narratives that examine the relationships between objects, and the meanings generated by their juxtaposition.

Bloom is interested in exploring the nature of looking and perceiving through her work, often drawing inspiration from literature. Bloom’s most recent exhibition at Capitain Petzel, Works on Paper, on Paper, was filled with references to her heroes of literature and film — from Vladimir Nabokov to Jean Seberg and Marilyn Monroe. Her series The Weather and Works for the Blind from her earlier show at Capitain Petzel, both take specific literary texts as points of departure, subsequently relaying them in braille through installations and multimedia photographic works.

Bloom had solo shows at the Kunsthal Aarhus, Denmark; at the MoMA, New York; Project Art Centre, Dublin; The Jewish Museum, New York; Martin-Gropius- Bau, Berlin; Museum of Contemporary Art, LA; Serpentine Gallery, London. She participated in group shows at the Museum für Angewandte Kunst, Leipzig; Palais de Tokyo, Paris; Hamburger Bahnhof, Berlin; Kunsthalle Wien; Stedelijk Museum, Amsterdam; Deichtorhallen, Hamburg, among others.

She has received numerous honors, including the Artist-in-Residence at the Design Library New York in 2002-23; the Visual Arts Grant from the New York Foundation for Contemporary Arts in 2016; the Wynn Newhouse Award in 2009; a Getty Research Institute Visiting Scholar appointment in 2007; the Visual Artist’s Fellowship from the National Endowment for the Arts in 2006; the Guggenheim Fellowship for Visual Art in 1998; the Venice Biennale Duamila Prize for Best Young Artist in 1988 amongst others. Her work can be found in public collections such as the Dutch National Collection, The Hague; Museum of Modern Art, New York; International Center of Photography, New York; Israel Museum, Jerusalem; Museum of Contemporary Art, Los Angeles; Helsinki Museum of Modern Art; Stedelijk Museum, Amsterdam; The Art Institute of Chicago; The New School, New York; ARTER, Istanbul; MAK Museum of Applied Arts, Vienna.