Christopher Cozier: New Level Heads

Ruffin Gallery at the University of Virginia is pleased to announce a new exhibition and public artist lecture by Christopher Cozier, the Department of Art’s 2025 Ruffin Distinguished Artist-in-Residence.

Christopher Cozier is a mixed-media artist who lives and works in Trinidad. His drawings, videos and installations investigate how Caribbean historical and contemporary experiences can inform our understanding of the wider world. He is co-founder and co-director of Alice Yard, an art collective based in Port of Spain that organizes art exhibitions, runs a residency program and hosts performances, film screenings, dialogues and lectures. He is a Prince Claus Award laureate (2013), a Pollock-Krasner Foundation grantee (2004), a previous Rauschenberg Foundation artist in residence (2016) and a recipient of the Jorge M. Pérez prize (2023). Recent exhibitions include Jacob Lawrence and Christopher Cozier, Collection Gallery, Museum of Modern Art (2024-25); Project a Black Planet: The Art and Culture of Panafrica, Art Institute of Chicago (2024–25); and Prospect 6: The Future Is Present, The Harbinger Is Home, New Orleans (2024–25).

Developed in 2016 during the Rauschenberg Residency on Captiva Island, Florida, New Level Heads is an interactive installation composed of rows of thin wooden planks suspended from the ceiling with string, atop which are interspersed silhouetted cardboard heads in profile. Dramatically lit, the elements of the installation move in a back-and-forth reciprocating motion activated by the spectator. The effect is of heads bobbing on the sea, addressing themes of migration and displacement as well as the threat of rising sea levels. As the artist writes, “I have always drawn these submerged heads. They refer to a condition - to a state of being - of suspension, on the move, between territories, be it cultures, nations and other social constructs.” Simple in its construction, the piece is inspired by the ephemeral aesthetics of Trinidad’s carnival, where monumental sets and spectacular costumes are created through an economy of means.

New Level Heads debuted in 2017 in the exhibition Relational Undercurrents: Contemporary Art of the Caribbean Archipelago curated by UVA professor Tatiana Flores. A major survey featuring over eighty artists, Relational Undercurrents was presented at the Museum of Latin American Art (MOLAA) in Long Beach, California as part of the Getty Foundation’s PST: LA/LA initiative. Previously, Flores and Cozier collaborated as co-curators in the exhibition Wrestling with the Image: Caribbean Interventions at the Art Museum of the Americas in Washington, D.C. in 2011 with support from the World Bank. New Level Heads at Ruffin Gallery will be the largest presentation to date of this installation. In addition to Relational Undercurrents, it was shown in the exhibition The Sea Is History at the Historical Museum in Oslo. —Tatiana Flores, Jefferson Scholars Foundation Edgar F. Shannon Professor of Art History at the University of Virginia

Artist lecture: February 19, 6:30–8pm, Campbell Hall Room 160 / Exhibition reception: February 21, 5–7pm, Ruffin Hall.

Ruffin Gallery at University of Virginia
Since 2008, the Ruffin Gallery has been an active part of the Studio Art program. Each year the gallery hosts four to six exhibits that serve as one of the University’s most important showcases for contemporary art and are an integral part of the Studio Art experience. Students are involved with the production of these exhibitions and gain valuable experience in the handling and hanging of exhibits. Every Spring the gallery is the site of the Fourth-Year Thesis and Aunspaugh Fellows Exhibitions. The openings are important occasions when the Studio Art program celebrates the successful completion of the major.

Press contact: Elena Yu, Gallery & Visiting Artist Coordinator, University of Virginia Art Department, ruffin-gallery [​at​] virginia.edu.

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New Level Heads was made possible with the support of the UVA Arts Council: Enriching the Arts on Grounds and the UVA Department of Art’s Ruffin Distinguished Artist-in-Residence funding.