The Hammer Museum’s much-anticipated Made in L.A. biennial is fast approaching, and with it comes the announcement of the 27 artists who will shape this year’s regional survey. The lineup includes conceptual heavyweight John Knight, Hood Century Modern founder Jerald “Coop” Cooper, and the avant-garde New Theater Hollywood, run by Calla Henkel and Max Pitegoff.
Now in its seventh edition, the biennial—curated by Essence Harden and Paulina Pobocha—remains committed to spotlighting Los Angeles-based artists but with a deliberate refusal to impose a single thematic throughline. Unlike the 2023 edition, which naturally gravitated toward pandemic-era production (earning the moniker “the Pandemic Zoom Biennial” from Los Angeles Times critic Christopher Knight), this iteration aims for a looser, more open-ended framework.
If there is a binding thread, it is the city itself—Los Angeles, a landscape of sprawling contradictions, cultural collisions, and fluid artistic communities. “There is a conversation happening between the artists, the work they make, and the context in which they make it—and that context being Los Angeles,” Pobocha notes.
To shape this edition, Harden and Pobocha embarked on an expansive studio pilgrimage, casting a wide net across disciplines and geographies, deliberately upending expectations of what a biennial should look like. The selection process favored an organic approach over rigid criteria, embracing nontraditional practices that defy easy categorization or market-driven constraints. “The goal,” says Pobocha, “was to follow the art, follow the artist, and see where that takes us.”
The result is a cross-section of artists spanning generations and geographies. The youngest, Ali Eyal, is 30 and was born in Baghdad; the oldest, Pat O’Neill, is 85. Other participating artists include David Alekhuogie, Black House Radio / Michael Donte, Greg Breda, Carl Cheng, Hanna Hur, Kristy Luck, Patrick Martinez, Beaux Mendes, Na Mira, Will Rawls, Brian Rochefort, Amanda Ross-Ho, Gabriela Ruiz, Alake Shilling, Nicole-Antonia Spagnola, Mike Stoltz, Peter Tomka, Freddy Villalobos, Kelly Wall, Leilah Weinraub, and Bruce Yonemoto.
Several works from the biennial will be considered for inclusion in the newly launched Mohn Art Collective: Hammer, LACMA, MOCA (MAC³), a joint collection between the Hammer Museum, Los Angeles County Museum of Art, and the Museum of Contemporary Art, established through a gift from Jarl and Pamela Mohn. With Made in L.A. serving as a primary source for acquisitions, MAC³ aims to build a growing archive of contemporary Los Angeles-based practice.
As always, artists in the biennial will compete for three prizes: the $100,000 Mohn Award for artistic excellence, a $25,000 award for career achievement, and a $25,000 audience-choice award determined by visitor votes.
With its mix of rising and established figures, Made in L.A. 2025 promises to offer an unfixed, prismatic view of the city’s ever-shifting creative terrain. The exhibition runs from October 5, 2025, to January 4, 2026.
