After studying at the Slade School of Fine Art at University College London (1974-1978), Hannah Collins completed her training in the USA on a Fulbright Scholarship (1974-1978). Collins is a multidisciplinary artist, who uses experimental video, multi-screen installations, text and large format photography. She received international acclaim as a trailblazer in choosing to work on an almost filmic scale in pursuit of the sentimental and spatial involvement of the viewer. Since the end of the 1970s, Collins’s work has focused on photographs and the conditions for producing meaning to deliberate on post-modern Europe. Her works are based on travel and documentation. Of particular interest are her anthropological explorations of marginal social groups, such as immigrants and ethnic minorities. She reflects their identifies, overlooked by the hegemonic history of global capitalism. She reveals the specific in opposition to the uniform generality of modernity in her emotional and ethical meditations on otherness, memory, the urban landscape, space or the marks of time, such as her Signs of Life (1992-1994) series of photographs taken in Istanbul and In the Course of Time (1994-1996), a series shot in eastern Europe, along with still-lifes in her everydayness and processuality.
During her career, Collins has taken part in multiple film festivals and other international events, including the Venice Biennale (1988 and 2011) and the Istanbul Biennial (1992). Her solo shows include her exhibitions at the Institute of Contemporary Art (London, 1989); the Tate Gallery (London, 2000); the Centre for Contemporary Art (Warsaw, 1993); the Centre d’Art Santa Mónica (Barcelona, 1993); the Centre for Contemporary Arts (Glasgow, 1996); the Irish Museum of Modern Art (Dublin, 1996); the Koldo Mitxelena Kulturunea (Donostia/San Sebastián, 1996); the Peer Foundation (London, 2003); Malaga Contemporary Art Centre (2003); Atrium Museum of Contemporary Art of the Basque Country (Vitoria-Gasteiz, 2008); the Georges Pompidou Centre (Paris, 2009); and the Sprengel Museum (Hannover, 2015). In 1991, Collins received the European Photography Reward, Berlin and in 2015 the Spectrum International Prize for Photography. In 1993, she was nominated for the Turner Prize.
After studying at the Slade School of Fine Art at University College London (1974-1978), Hannah Collins completed her training in the USA on a Fulbright Scholarship (1974-1978). Collins is a multidisciplinary artist, who uses experimental video, multi-screen installations, text and large format photography. She received international acclaim as a trailblazer in choosing to work on an almost filmic scale in pursuit of the sentimental and spatial involvement of the viewer. Since the end of the 1970s, Collins’s work has focused on photographs and the conditions for producing meaning to deliberate on post-modern Europe. Her works are based on travel and documentation. Of particular interest are her anthropological explorations of marginal social groups, such as immigrants and ethnic minorities. She reflects their identifies, overlooked by the hegemonic history of global capitalism. She reveals the specific in opposition to the uniform generality of modernity in her emotional and ethical meditations on otherness, memory, the urban landscape, space or the marks of time, such as her Signs of Life (1992-1994) series of photographs taken in Istanbul and In the Course of Time (1994-1996), a series shot in eastern Europe, along with still-lifes in her everydayness and processuality.
During her career, Collins has taken part in multiple film festivals and other international events, including the Venice Biennale (1988 and 2011) and the Istanbul Biennial (1992). Her solo shows include her exhibitions at the Institute of Contemporary Art (London, 1989); the Tate Gallery (London, 2000); the Centre for Contemporary Art (Warsaw, 1993); the Centre d’Art Santa Mónica (Barcelona, 1993); the Centre for Contemporary Arts (Glasgow, 1996); the Irish Museum of Modern Art (Dublin, 1996); the Koldo Mitxelena Kulturunea (Donostia/San Sebastián, 1996); the Peer Foundation (London, 2003); Malaga Contemporary Art Centre (2003); Atrium Museum of Contemporary Art of the Basque Country (Vitoria-Gasteiz, 2008); the Georges Pompidou Centre (Paris, 2009); and the Sprengel Museum (Hannover, 2015). In 1991, Collins received the European Photography Reward, Berlin and in 2015 the Spectrum International Prize for Photography. In 1993, she was nominated for the Turner Prize.