LEE Nikki S

Nikki S. Lee is a contemporary Korean artist best known for her identity shifting photographs and videos of American subcultures. Often shot with disposable cameras by passersby, Lee's most recognizable photographs including her Hispanic Project, are self-portraits reminiscent of those by Cindy Sherman. Dressed and made up in different outfits, Lee posed herself as a punk, yuppie, Hispanic woman, or black hip-hop star. “I don't want to carry big things around with me. I'm lazy. The snapshot camera, you just carry it around and take the picture,” the artist said of her process. “You don't need to think about anything. People in the street are not going to wait for you with a big camera. They would freak out. With a snapshot camera, they are comfortable.” Born in 1970 in South Korea, Lee earned her BFA at Chung-Ang University in South Korea in 1993 before moving to New York in 1994 where she studied at the Fashion Institute of Technology. Lee finished her studies at New York University, where she received an MA in photography in 1998. She currently lives and works in Seoul, South Korea, her works are included in the collections of the Institute of Contemporary Art in Boston, the Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum in New York, and the Hirshhorn Museum and Sculpture Garden in Washington, D.C.