Yamini Nayar was born in Rochester, NY in 1975, and raised outside Detroit, MI. She received her BFA from the Rhode Island School of Design, and her MFA from the School of Visual Arts, New York, where she currently serves as a thesis advisor.
Nayar has participated in residencies at the Lower Manhattan Cultural Council (2011-12), New York University (2011-12), the Center for Photography at Woodstock (2010), Art Academy of Cincinnati (2010). She has exhibited her work internationally at venues including the Indian Art Summit, 2014, Yerba Buena Center for the Arts, San Francisco, CA, 2013, Queensland Art Gallery, Brisbane, Australia, 2012, DeCordova Museum, Lincoln, MA, 2012, Sharjah Biennial, Sharjah, UAE, 2011, Cincinnati Art Museum, Cincinnati, OH, 2010, Saatchi Gallery, London, UK, 2010, Exit Art, New York, NY, 2007, and the Queens Museum of Art, Queens, NY, 2005. Nayar’s work is included in numerous public and private collections, including the Saatchi Museum, Queensland Art Museum, Cincinnati Art Museum, Queens Museum and US Arts in Embassies. Her work has been featured in publications and magazines that include Unfixed: Postcolonial Photography in Contemporary Art, Jap Sam Books, 2013 and Manual for Treason: Sharjah Biennial, 2011, The New York Times, New Yorker Magazine, Art India, Artforum, Art in America, Frieze, Vogue India, Artpapers, and Art Economist. She is the recipient of a 2014 Art Matters grant for research and production.
Nayar’s work is represented by Thomas Erben in New York and Jhaveri Contemporary in Mumbai.