Sam Taylor-Johnson is a contemporary British photographer and filmmaker. Interested in the relationship between identity and appearance, her work examines the contradictions between our interior lives and our exterior presentations of the self. “I wanted to become an artist because it meant endless possibilities,” she explained. “Art was a way of reinventing myself.” Born Samantha Louise “Sam” Taylor-Wood on March 4, 1967 in Croydon, United Kingdom, the artist turned from sculpture to photography and film in the 1990s after graduating from Goldsmiths College, merging a cinematic sensibility with her still images. Part of the Young British Artists group that emerged in the 1990s, she is now best known for her mainstream feature-length films Nowhere Boy (2009) and Fifty Shades of Grey (2015). She was awarded the title of Officer of the Most Excellent Order of the British Empire for her contributions to British arts and culture in 2011. Taylor-Johnson currently lives and works with her husband the actor Aaron Taylor-Johnson between Los Angeles, CA and London, United Kingdom. The artist’s works are held in the collections of the Art Institute of Chicago, The Museum of Modern Art in New York, the Walker Art Center in Minneapolis, and the National Galleries of Scotland in Edinburgh, among others.