susan pui san lok is an artist and writer based in London. Her work ranges across installation, moving image, sound, performance and text, evolving out of interests in archives, nostalgia and aspiration, place and migration, translation and diaspora.
susan pui san lok holds degrees in Fine Art (1994) and Feminism and the Visual Arts from the University of Leeds (1996) and completed a combined practice/theory PhD in Fine Art with Aavaa (the African and Asian Visual Artists Archive) at the University of East London (2004). She was Co-Investigator on the AHRC research project, Black Artists and Modernism, and recently joined the University of the Arts London as a Reader in Fine Art.
Her latest major solo exhibition at Firstsite, ‘A COVEN A GROVE A STAND’ (2019), explored the folklore surrounding witchcraft and the history of witch persecutions across East Anglia. Other recent exhibitions include ‘FLOW’, Asia Art Activism, Raven Row, London (2018); ‘Common Third’, Copperfield Gallery, London (2018); ‘Diaspora Pavilion’, Palazzo Pisani Santa Marina, Venice (2017).
susan pui san lok has contributed to Iniva’s program on a number of occasions. In 2016, she was a speaker at the two-day conference ‘Now & Then, Here & There: Black Artists and Modernism’ addressing the understated connections and points of contention between Black-British artists’ practice and the work of art’s relationship to Modernism, produced by Black Artists & Modernism (BAM) in association with Iniva. Also as part of BAM, she contributed to ‘Li Yuan Chia Study Day’ at Iniva in 2017, a participatory event focused on generating new readings of the artist’s work, invite personal responses and inspire continuing dialogue. She engaged in conversation with artist Ayesha Tan Jones for ‘Research Network: Optimystic Dystopia’ at Iniva in 2019. The performative talk presented by Ayesha explores the spiritual practice of self-care in an alternative, queer, optimistic dystopia.
susan pui san lok lives and works in London, UK.