Ezra Šimek (b. 1997) is an artist, writer and cultural worker based in Vienna. They received their BA in Photography from Prague’s Film and TV School of the Academy of Performing Arts, their MA in Contemporary Art Theory and Practice at the Academy of Fine Arts and Design in Bratislava, Slovakia, and their MA in TransArts at the University of Applied Arts in Vienna. In their work, Šimek primarily deals with queer identities and linguistic sensitivity, expressed through various time-based media, site-responsive installations, sound works, and writing. They explore gender as a societal construct akin to mythology, fostering synergy among multiple subjectivities to envision a new, inclusive, speculative reality.
They were an artist-in-residence at Cité internationale des arts Paris (2024) and at the International Studio & Curatorial Program in New York (2023). Their work and films have been presented at, among others, Tenerife Espacio de las Artes (2024), Kunsthalle Bratislava (2024), Gianni Manhattan, Vienna (2023), Czech Center New York (2023), Medium Gallery, Bratislava (2023), Diagonale Festival, Graz (2023), Fotogalerie Wien (2023), National Gallery in Prague (2022), Prague City Gallery (2022), Museum of Contemporary Art Zagreb (2022), Světova 1, Prague (2022), VUNU Gallery, Košice (2022), and Haus Wien (2021). They are a recipient of the Jindřich Chalupecký Art Award (2022).