Lawrence Paul Yuxweluptun Lets’lo:tseltun

Of Cowichan (Hul’q’umi’num Coast Salish) and Okanagan (Syilx) descent, Lawrence Paul Yuxweluptun (b.1957) is one of the most outspoken and influential contemporary artists in Canada today. Yuxweluptun presents his ideas through hard-hitting, polemical, but also playful artworks that now span a forty year career. Yuxweluptuns’ works can be brutal critiques of issues such as land title, residential schools, and the destruction of the environment, making him a pivotal voice in contemporary art. He lives and works on unceded, traditional and ancestral xwməθkwəy̓ əm (Musqueam), Sḵwx̱ wú7mesh Úxwumixw (Squamish), and səl̓ ilw̓ ətaʔɬ (Tsleil-Waututh) territories.

Yuxweluptun has participated in more than 25 pivotal exhibitions internationally, with a forthcoming exhibition at the Art Gallery of New South Wales (2027), and presentations at the Tate Modern (2024, London, United Kingdom), Heard Museum (2023, Phoenix, AZ), Philbrook Museum of Art (2023, Tulsa, OK), Eiteljorg Museum (2022 Indianapolis, Indiana), the Haus der Kulturen der Welt (2023, Berlin, Germany), Crown-Indigenous Relations and Northern Affairs Canada (CIRNAC), Indigenous Art Collection (2021-2023, Sussex Courtyards in Ottawa, ON), McMichael Canadian Art Collection (2021, Ontario), Montreal Museum of Fine Art (2020, 2021, Montreal, QB), Crystal Bridges Museum of American Art (2018-2020, Bentonville, Arkansas), SITE Santa Fe (2018, New Mexico), the Art Gallery of Ontario (2017, Toronto), the Vancouver Art Gallery (1997, 2005, 2006, 2011, 2020), the National Gallery of Canada (2013, 2014, Ottawa, Ontario) and the Banff Centre for the Arts (2003, Alberta). In 2016, the Museum of Anthropology at the University of British Columbia mounted a major 30-year survey of his work, titled Unceded Territories. In February 2026, Yuxweluptun was announced as the 2025 recipient of the Gershon Iskowitz Prize in honour of his artistic excellence and contribution to contemporary Canadian art.