Angela Ellsworth (b. 1964, Palo Alto, California) is a multidisciplinary artist exploring identity, culture, and tradition, often drawing from her personal experiences with Mormonism.
 

One of Ellsworth’s most important series is The Seer Bonnets: A Continuing Offense, which are sculptural bonnets made of thousands of steel, pearl-tipped corsage pins. These pieces draw inspiration from the thirty-five wives of Joseph Smith, the founder of the Mormon faith, who were seen as possessors of “tools of translation” for interpreting spiritual messages. Ellsworth reinterprets these symbolic bonnets to honor women’s contributions and emphasize their roles as visionaries, while also acknowledging their generational trauma. The bonnets symbolize resilience, spirituality, and the act of creation that extends beyond religious texts into personal and collective histories.
 

Ellsworth’s broader body of work examines themes of endurance, the body’s connection to space and time, and societal perceptions of health. By integrating performance, sculpture, and historical narrative elements, Ellsworth offers personal and universal insights into power, gender, and spirituality.

Her solo and collaborative works have addressed wide-ranging subjects such as physical fitness, endurance, illness, social ritual, and religious tradition. She is interested in art merging with everyday life and public and private experiences colliding in unexpected places.

She has presented work nationally and internationally including the Getty Center (Los Angeles), Museum of Contemporary Art (Sydney), Australia), Zacheta National Gallery of Art (Warsaw, Poland), National Review of Live Art (Glasgow, Scotland), Los Angeles Contemporary Exhibitions (Los Angeles, California), Crystal Bridges (Bentonville, Arkansas), Arizona State University Art Museum (Tempe, Arizona), Museum of Contemporary Art (Denver), Colorado), Scottsdale Museum of Contemporary Art (Scottsdale, Arizona), and Phoenix Art Museum (Phoenix, Arizona.)

Awards and grants include Art Matters, Franklin Furnace, New Jersey State Council on the Arts, The Pennsylvania Council for the Arts, New Forms Regional Initiative Grant, from Mexic-Arte Museum, and DiverseWorks, funded by The Andy Warhol Foundation and The Rockefeller Foundation. She is represented by Lisa Sette Gallery in Phoenix Arizona and Modern West Fine Art, Salt Lake City.