Alex Katz and Carrie Mae Weems receive the National Medal of the Arts

Carrie Mae Weems, Alex Katz and Mark Bradford were awarded the National Medal of Arts, a government award for American artists and philanthropists. The award is decided by the presidentially appointed National Council on the Arts, an advisory committee that oversees public funding for culture.

The artists will be honored today at a ceremony at the White House in Washington DC, where the 2022 and 2023 honorees will be honored. It is the final ceremony surrounding the national arts award led by President Biden before the presidential election in November.

Weems is known for her photographic work on race in America and is currently the subject of a survey at CCS Bard's Museum. Katz, the subject of a retrospective at the Guggenheim Museum in 2022, is known for his stark portraits of people around him. The two artists were part of the 2022 and 2023 honoree classes, respectively.

Bradford, the youngest of the three contemporary artists to receive the award, was also among the 2023 honorees. He is known for abstracts that allude to aspects of black history, some of which are featured in his U.S. pavilion for the Venice Biennale were seen in 2017.

The 2022 and 2023 honorees also include filmmakers Spike Lee and Ken Burns and the late sculptor Ruth Asawa. Jo Carole Lauder, a New York-based art collector who is active in giving circles in the Washington, D.C. area, was also named as a recipient.