The Ethopian-born American artist joins a varied selection including musician Megan Thee Stallion, U.S. president Donald Trump and the organisers of the Black Lives Matter movement, all nominated for the individual ways in which they have shaped the world (for better or for worse).
Julie Mehretu - photo © Heather Sten
Presented by architect David Adjaye, Mehretu is lauded for her abstract large-scale, three-dimensional landscapes that depict the turmoil of our socio-political climate: “She creates her own language that serves as a portal to a place where expressionism collapses time, only to reveal our relationship to space. [...] Her art holds qualities of memory, history, global mobilities, inequities and sense of place, but through a universal lens.”
This exploration of our relationship to space, which individuals and governments alike have been forced to reconsider more than ever in this strange year of pandemic-enforced quarantine, may reveal why Mehretu was an obvious choice for Time’s 2020 list, but may also help to explain the lack of other artists from the selection. As galleries, museums and fairs have been forced to close, Covid-19 and a lack of funding has driven the arts to have to take a back seat. Time’s 2020 list reflects the unpredictable path this year has taken, featuring a record number of doctors, nurses and scientists, as well as a significant number of activists.
