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Theaster Gates is a Chicago-based artist who bridges sculpture, installation, performance, urban planning, and land development. Born in 1973 and raised in the East Garfield Park neighborhood on the West Side of Chicago, Gates studied Urban Planning and Ceramics at Iowa State University, earning a Bachelor's degree in 1996. After further pottery training in Japan and traveling through South Africa, Gates pursued a Master's in Fine Arts and Religious Studies at the University of Cape Town, finishing in 1998. Gates later returned to Iowa State to earn a second Master's in Urban Planning, Ceramics, and Religious Studies.

In terms of style and medium, Gates' projects often rely on salvaged materials, like decommissioned firehoses or discarded roofing supplies, to create artworks that connect deeply with civil rights history and working-class life. Central to Gates' artistic language is his engagement with clay and craft. His ceramic work, from minimalist vessels to narrative installations, links the tactile nature of making with broader socio-political concerns. This is exemplified in his Civil Tapestry and tar painting series, which reinterprets Modernist art forms using historically charged, utilitarian materials. These works offer a meditation on transformation, labor, and the dignity embedded in everyday objects and gestures.

Gates transforms neglected spaces and materials into platforms for cultural engagement and political reflection. His work explores the meaning of "Black space" through the lens of collective memory, community action, and aesthetic agency. Challenging traditional notions of artistic value and the established canon by incorporating elements of social practice, architecture, and archival preservation into his projects, Gates is widely recognized for his efforts to revitalize disinvested urban communities, particularly through the Rebuild Foundation. This organization has reimagined and reconfigured abandoned buildings on Chicago's South Side as cultural hubs—such as the Stony Island Arts Bank and the Dorchester Art + Housing Collaborative—while setting up housing archives, exhibitions, and programming that foreground Black cultural heritage.

Music and performance are also integral to Gates' practice, particularly through his group The Black Monks, who blend Black southern musical traditions with Eastern monastic influences. This interdisciplinary approach to sound, ritual, and storytelling complements Gates' larger mission: to activate art as a tool for historical recovery, communal healing, and structural change. His work has been celebrated globally and earned him numerous awards, including the Nasher Prize for Sculpture and the Légion d'Honneur. Through all facets of his activist oeuvre, Gates continues to push the boundaries of what art can do in public and private life.