Transformer is a Washington, DC based artist-centered, non-profit visual arts organization. Founded in June 2002 by artists & arts organizers, Transformer’s mission is to connect, elevate, and serve a diversity of emerging artists and arts leaders. Transformer develops innovative, multi-faceted exhibition and program platforms, both independently and through global partnerships, to present artists’ evolving ideas and work, advance new and best visual arts practices, and engage audiences with emerging contemporary art. Transformer is committed to inclusivity, professional excellence, artist equity, open dialogue, expansive cultural exchange, and freedom of artistic expression. Artist-centered in everything it does, Transformer serves as both a catalyst and advocate for emergent expression in the visual arts. Transformer is honored to be widely recognized by artists and growing communities of supporters for advancing emerging artists and experimental artistic concepts. Sophisticated in its programming, while retaining its founding punk rock ethos, Transformer propels artists who define what’s happening now and next in contemporary visual art.
Transformer
Installation view of Very Sad Lab: The Incubator at Transformer, a living, growing site-specific installation, resource lab, and series of pre-plant-parent programs by Very Sad Lab, a houseplant rehabilitation and research-based community-engaged art project developed by DC based artists Valerie Wiseman and Naoko Wowsugi, February – March 2022, mixed media (sculpture, plants, video, sound) installation. Courtesy of Transformer.
Programming documentation of DC artist Adele Kenworthy’s Femme AAPI Fruit Cutting Circle, August 2022. Presented as part of to carry within us an orchard, a mini-installation within the 19th year of Transformer’s Exercises for Emerging Artists program focusing on Artistic Interventions. Courtesy of Transformer.
Installation view of Commemorative Strands, Transformer’s 19th Annual DC Artist Solo Exhibition, by Artise Fletcher. Commemorative Strands explored the sociological meanings and issues surrounding hair, especially in Black culture, through the presentation of large tapestries that are the artists’ reimagined versions of commemorative cloths using synthetic Kanekalon hair, along with photographs and projected video works; September / October, 2022. Courtesy of Transformer.
Exhibition view of Transformer20 retrospective title wall text featuring a 2004 drawing by DC artists Amanda Klienman of Transformer’s 1404 P St, NW storefront. Transformer20, November - December 2022. Courtesy of Transformer.
See Also
1994
On May 13, 1994 the Andy Warhol Museum opened its doors to the public. The museum holds the largest collection of Warhol’s artworks and archival materials, and is the most comprehensive single-artist museums in the world and the largest in North America.