Beverly McIver is a significant presence in contemporary American art and has charted a new direction as an African American woman artist. She is committed to making art that consistently examines racial, gender, social, and occupational identities.

McIver was born in Greensboro, North Carolina, and is the youngest of three girls. Her oldest sister Renee is mentally disabled and is a frequent subject of the artist, as are other family members. Raising Renee, a feature-length documentary film produced in association with HBO by Academy Award-nominated and award-winning filmmakers Steven Ascher and Jeanne Jordan, tells the story of the impact of McIver’s promise to care for her sister when their mother dies. The film, which is available on Amazon Prime, played in festivals around the country and was nominated for an Emmy Award.

McIver’s work is in the collection of the National Portrait Gallery at the Smithsonian, the North Carolina Museum of Art, the Weatherspoon Art Museum, the Baltimore Museum of Art, the Asheville Museum of Art, the Crocker Art Museum, the Nelson Fine Arts Center Art Museum at Arizona State University, the Nasher Museum of Art at Duke University, the Cameron Art Museum and the Mint Museum, as well as significant corporate and private collections.

McIver’s recent honors include a yearlong residency at the American Academy in Rome, where she was featured in Beverly McIver e il colore nero, a documentary for Italian television. In 2017, she received the lifetime achievement award from the Anyone Can Fly Foundation in a ceremony hosted by artist Faith Ringgold. McIver has received numerous grants and awards including a John Simon Guggenheim Fellowship, a Radcliffe Fellowship from Harvard University, a Marie Walsh Sharpe Foundation Award, a Louis Comfort Tiffany Foundation Award, and a Creative Capital grant. McIver is currently the Ebenshade Professor of the Practice in Studio Arts at Duke University. In 2021, she is curating a show of contemporary African American artists working in North Carolina for Craven Allen Gallery in Durham, North Carolina. In 2022, a career survey of the artist’s work will begin at the Scottsdale Museum of Contemporary Art before touring the country.

The appearance of Beverly McIver is made possible by generous gifts from Pinnacle Financial Partners, Solie Fott, and Rena Ellzy.