Leilah Weinraub

Join director and artist Leilah Weinraub for a lecture on her multidisciplinary practice which often extends across film, performance and installation.

The Weitzman Department of Fine Arts at the University of Pennsylvania and the Institute of Contemporary Art are pleased to present an artist lecture and presentation with Leilah Weinraub whose work organizes power, identity, labor and desire through genre-merging strategies that move between fiction and reality. Weinraub combines film noir, documentary, comedy and performance in works that extend from screens to stages and public space.

This free public lecture is part of a series that gathers distinguished artists, activists, writers, and disruptors whose work engages with the social and cultural themes of our time.

Registration
Register to attend this event here. | Watch this program via Zoom here.

ICA is committed to creating a welcoming environment for all visitors. For more notes on accessibility including accessible parking nearby visit our Accessibility landing page. If you require any accessibility accommodations or have any questions about the program, please contact us at hello@ica.upenn.edu

About the Artist
Leilah Weinraub was born in 1979 in Los Angeles. An artist, film director, and performer, Weinraub is best known for the underground documentary Shakedown (2018). Her latest film, Seek No Favor (2025), codirected with Elle Clay, premieres at the BlackStar Film Festival. Weinraub recently held a residency at New Theater Hollywood, where her performance work evolved in dialogue with her cinematic practice. Recent solo presentations include Gavin Brown’s Enterprise, New York (2018) and What Pipeline, Detroit (2018). Group exhibitions include the 35th Bienal de São Paulo (2023); Centre d’Art Contemporain, Geneva (2021); Kunsthall Stavanger, Stavanger, Norway (2021); Performa, New York (2021); Sullivan Galleries, School of the Art Institute of Chicago (2019); Gavin Brown’s Enterprise, New York (2018); and the Whitney Museum of American Art, New York (2017). Weinraub studied at Antioch College, Yellow Springs, OH, and the Milton Avery Graduate School of Arts at Bard College, Annandale-on-Hudson, NY. Beyond filmmaking, Weinraub was a co-founder and CEO of Hood By Air, where she directed the brand’s creative and strategic identity, runway shows, films, and global presentations—shaping HBA’s emergence as a defining cultural phenomenon of the 2010s.

ICA is committed to creating a welcoming environment for all visitors. For more notes on accessibility including accessible parking nearby visit our Accessibility landing page. If you require any accessibility accommodations or have any questions about the program, please contact Derek Rigby (mrigby@ica.upenn.edu).

In their varied approaches and techniques, these individuals speak to ICA’s ethos of artistic experimentation and practice that engages with the social and cultural themes of our time. As artists, writers, and cultural producers, their artwork and criticism expand across themes of popular culture, queer life, kinship & community, and de/construction through the utilization of sculpture, performance, sound, collage, installation, and more.

In this lecture series, we invite you all to engage in conversation with our participants and become a part of an active dialogue that explores the stake of contemporary art in our society and culture.

Support
The Master of Fine Arts program at Penn is focused on the professional development of visual artists. Through workshops, seminar courses, international residency opportunities and interactions with curators, writers and artists, the program provides an open intellectual framework to foster independent methods of artistic research.

Programming at ICA is made possible in part by the Emily and Jerry Spiegel Fund to Support Contemporary Culture and Visual Arts and the Lise Spiegel Wilks and Jeffrey Wilks Family Foundation. Public and Student Engagement at ICA is supported by the Bernstein Public Engagement Fund, Suzanne Weiss Doft & Jacob W. Doft, Stacey & Robert Goergen Jr., Hilarie L. & Mitchell Morgan, the Nash Family Foundation, Joline & David Stemerman, and by Dana McDonald Strong & Mark W. Strong.