Lex Morgan Lancaster (they/them) works at the intersections of queer and trans theories and contemporary art practices. Cultivating a queer-trans formalism, their research centers artworks that refuse transparent representation and work instead through volatile materiality and embodied encounter to generate queer, trans, anti-racist, and crip tactics.

Lancaster's scholarship is published in Art Journal, ASAP/Journal, Discourse: Journal for Theoretical Studies in Media and Culture, and Texte Zur Kunst, and their book, Dragging Away: Queer Abstraction in Contemporary Art, was published by Duke University Press in 2022.

Lancaster’s current book project, Dysphoric Aesthetics: Trans Art and Embodied Theory, reclaims dysphoria for trans ethics and aesthetics through embodied encounters with recent trans art practices (see their recent article on “Dysphoric Aesthetics” in Art Journal, 2026).

Lancaster is Assistant Professor of the History and Theory of Art, Faculty of Humanities and Social Science at The Cooper Union for the Advancement of Science and Art. They received their PhD in art history and visual culture studies from the University of Wisconsin-Madison.

Contact: lex.lancaster@cooper.edu