Leyla Cárdenas (b. 1975 Bogota, Colombia) received her BA in Fine Arts from Los Andes University and her MFA from the University of California Los Angeles (UCLA). Her installation, sculpture, mixed-media work delves into urban ruins and cities landscapes as indications of social transformation, loss and historical memory. Remains, fragments, discarded structures, are used as material for her work, with a sculptural strategy that is as much destructive as constructive.

Recent projects include a 2022 commission to participate in the 16th Lyon Biennale “Manifesto of Fragility”. In 2019 she was awarded the CIFO Award, in 2018 she was part of the Cuenca Biennial in Ecuador. In 2017, her work Excisión was part of the show Home, so different, so appealing that was exhibited at LACMA as part of the Pacific Standard Time project: LA / LA of the Getty and in the MFAH. In 2017 she participated in the California Pacific Triennial at OCMA (Orange County Museum of Art).

Her work has been shown at Museo de Barrio- NY, Palais de Tokyo-Paris, Galería Max Estrella-Madrid, Casas Riegner Gallery-Bogotá, Q21Museums Quartier-Wien, Museo de Arte de Zapopán- México, CAM-Raleigh, Institute of Contemporary Art-SanJose (SJICA), Museo de Arte Moderno-Medellín, Maison de l ́Amérique Latine-Paris, Apexart-New York, Banco de la República Bogotá, Dimensions Variable, Miami, among others. In addition, she has had solo shows in Bogotá, San Jose, Miami, Paris, Los Angeles and Madrid.

Cárdenas work can be found in public and private collections in
Colombia, South America, Europe and throughout the States.