LJ Roberts talk, Queer Kinships, Re-Mixed Histories, Fiber as Flexible Practice: An Artist Lecture, presents an overview of the artists work that spans almost 20 years. Approaching textiles with a political urgency, Roberts addresses topics such queer/trans politics, activism, and the on-going AIDS epidemic.

Invested in the flexibility that a textile practice affords, Roberts creates works that range from small, intricate embroidered portraits of their friends, collaborators and loose community, to large scale knitted, quilted, mixed-media installations that explore ideas of alternative kinship structures, nomadism, landlessness and concepts that traverse time and space.

Much of their work is done in transit and they access tools such as toy knitting machines to question and experiment with ideas of mastery in craft practices Through various material investigations Roberts asks: How does reconsidering narratives of the past work to navigate the shaky unknown of the present day? How do contemporary material practices aid in understandings of futurities, connections, and migrations? How might material investigations transform future concepts of movement and identity?

During their time in Sweden LJ is making large-scale textile mixed media collaged wall pieces that imagine post-apocalyptic vehicles and vessels that re-mix queer and trans histories and narratives with speculative fiction to traverse time and space.

LJ Roberts is a visual artist who creates large-scale textile installations, intricate embroideries, screen prints, artist books, and collages. Their work investigates overlaps of queer and trans politics, activism, protest, narrative, and craft. LJ's work has been shown at such venues as The Brooklyn Museum, Museum of Arts and Design, Yerba Buena Center of the Arts, The Victoria and Albert Museum, The 8th Floor, Vox Populi, The Orange County Museum of Art, The Leslie-Lohman Museum of Gay and Lesbian Art, The Powerhouse Museum, The Oakland Museum of California, The DePaul Art Museum, The ONE National Gay and Lesbian Archives at The University of Southern California, Los Angeles Contemporary Exhibitions, The Bowdoin College Museum of Art, The Museum of the City of New York, and the Smithsonian Museum of American Art where their work is in the permanent collection. Their work will be featured in the upcoming show, Nobody Promised You Tomorrow, at The Brooklyn Museum in Spring of 2019.

LJ has been the past recipient of a MacDowell Colony Fellowship, the Fountainhead Fellowship at Virginia Commonwealth University, a QueensLab Space Grant, and residencies at Ox-Bow School of Art, ACRE, The Textile Arts Center, and The Bag Factory in Johannesburg, South Africa.

In 2015 LJ was one of nine recipients of The White House Champions of Change Award for LGBTQI Artists.

Currently LJ is in residence at the International Artists Studio Program (IASPIS) in Stockholm.

LJ lives and works in Brooklyn, NY and is part-time faculty at Parsons School of Design.