Sasha Phyars-Burgess

Sasha Phyars-Burgess
Born1988 (age 37–38)
Brooklyn, New York, U.S.
Alma mater
AwardsGuggenheim Fellowship (2023)

Sasha Phyars-Burgess (born 1988) is an American photographer. Her work explores her Trinidadian-American heritage, particularly in her 2021 book Untitled, and she is a 2023 Guggenheim Fellow.

Biography

Sasha Phyars-Burgess was born in 1988 in Brooklyn,[1] and raised in Bethlehem, Pennsylvania.[2] Her parents are Trinidadian-American.[2]

Phyars-Burgess attended Bard College, where she got a BA in Photography in 2010.[2] She then won several awards, such as the Tierney Fellowship and the Garrison Art Center's 2011 Best in Show Award.[3] She briefly lived in Berlin to exhibit work for the CK Gallery, as well as in Trinidad and Tobago to document the Trinidad and Tobago Carnival.[3][4] In 2016, she held an exhibition at Enfoco in New York City; titled THERE (Yankee), it explored her Trinidadian-American heritage as a theme.[4] She obtained her MFA at Cornell University in 2018.[5]

In February 2021, the Capricious Foundation published Phyars-Burgess' first monograph, Untitled, where her Trinidadian-American heritage is explored as a theme.[6][7] Hannah Abel-Hirsch said that her book "depict[s] everyday moments observed by Phyars-Burgess’ meditative lens [and] contribute to a photographic archive of Black life created by Black image-makers, depicting the fullness of their existence despite the continual threats against it; threats and violence which otherwise dominate contemporary representations of Black life."[8] Untitled won the 2021 Paris Photo–Aperture Foundation PhotoBook Award for First PhotoBook.[9] In 2023, she was awarded a Guggenheim Fellowship in Photography.[10] She has also served as artist-in-residence for the Maryland Institute College of Art's Photography + Media & Society MFA program.[11]

Phyars-Burgess' series of photographs on "the global impact of sugar cane plantations on the people and land of the Black diaspora" were featured in the 2024 Lincoln University exhibition Ratoon.[12] In 2025, she held Everything Nice, a exhibition of photographs that "explore histories of slavery, sugarcane cultivation and survival across the African diaspora", at Syracuse University’s Light Work gallery.[13] Phyars-Burgess announced that her Everything Nice project would later involve Trinidad and Tobago, Brazil, and several African countries.[13] Earlier that year, she was part of Bryan Schutmaat and Pablo Cabado's 2025 joint exhibition United Worlds.[14]

Living in Chicago in 2021,[8] she had moved to Bethlehem in 2024.[12] She is also a close friend and collaborator with Carolyn Lazard, a classmate from Bard.[8]

References

  1. ^ Staff (September 29, 2025). "Sasha Phyars-Burgess: Everything Nice". Light Work. Retrieved February 7, 2026.
  2. ^ a b c Goodinson, Elena (January 28, 2021). "Black on both sides: the African diaspora around the world – in pictures". The Guardian. ISSN 0261-3077. Retrieved February 7, 2026.
  3. ^ a b "Sasha Phyars-Burgess". Laundromat Project. Retrieved February 7, 2026.
  4. ^ a b Turner, Aaron R. (October 13, 2016). "Sasha Phyars-Burgess: THERE (Yankee)". Lenscratch. Retrieved February 7, 2026.
  5. ^ "Sasha Phyars-Burgess Archives". Cornell AAP. Retrieved February 7, 2026.
  6. ^ "Untitled". Capricious Foundation. Retrieved February 7, 2026.
  7. ^ "Untitled Sasha Phyars-Burgess". delpire & co. Retrieved February 7, 2026.
  8. ^ a b c Abel-Hirsch, Hannah. "Sasha Phyars-Burgess gently observes, and meditates upon, the Black lives around her in her first monograph, Untitled". www.1854.photography. Retrieved February 7, 2026.
  9. ^ "Announcing the Winners of the 2021 PhotoBook Awards". Aperture. November 12, 2021. Retrieved February 7, 2026.
  10. ^ "Sasha Phyars-Burgess". Guggenheim Fellowships. Retrieved February 7, 2026.
  11. ^ "Artist-in-Residence Sasha Phyars-Burgess Wins Prestigious Paris Photo and Aperture Foundation Award". MICA. Retrieved February 7, 2026.
  12. ^ a b "Lincoln University explores the Black diaspora via sugar cane". WHYY. Retrieved February 7, 2026.
  13. ^ a b Hughes, Kymani (September 23, 2025). "'Everything Nice' honors African diaspora's resilience with vivid photographs". The Daily Orange. Retrieved February 7, 2026.
  14. ^ Feinsilber, Laura (June 16, 2025). "Notable exposición de ocho fotógrafos estadounidenses". Ámbito Financiero. ProQuest 3219524985.
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