Phoebe Legere

Legere, who has Native American heritage, has been an outspoken advocate for female, gay, Native American, and universal civil rights. She will represent North America at Cannes 2018.

She wrote and starred in the play Speed Queen: The Joe Carstairs Story, performing as multiple characters in a musical about the life of Marion Barbara 'Joe' Carstairs (1900-1993), the wealthy British power boat racer known for her speed and eccentric lifestyle. The production combined storytelling, painting, sculpture, movie stars, costumes, and music. Legere performed this transdisciplinary play seven times between March 7 and March 24, 2018, at Dixon Place, in the main performance space of the New York City theater organization dedicated to the development of artwork from a broad range of performers and artists.

Legere was touring again in 2017, bringing art and music to the children in low income communities on behalf of her nonprofit Foundation for New American Art, founded in 2016.

In 2015, Legere appeared on It's Me, Hilary: The Man Who Drew Eloise, an HBO documentary produced by Lena Dunham about Hilary Knight who is best known as the illustrator of Kay Thompson's Eloise series of children's books.

In 2013, she created The Shamancycle, a four-wheeled alternative vehicle designed in the form of a moving giant eagle sculpture constructed from repurposed metal and powered by alternative energy and having room for 15 people, the idea for which came to her in a dream.

Beginning in 2001, Legere worked as Head Writer, on-air host, and interviewer for Roulette TV, a collection of video programs broadcast online and on New York City cable television, that captures the creative process of live performance at "the extreme frontier edge of art and music" and is dedicated to experimental art and music. Legere's musical invention the Sneakers of Samothrace were the subject of one episode of the program on 9 December 2007. She was interviewed afterward by David Behrman, an American composer and pioneer of computer music, revealing that her first job was resident composer for The Wooster Group and discussing in detail their influence on her art making.

Legere is Founder and archivist for the New York Underground Museum (founded 2006).

In 2000, with composer Morgan Powell, she co-wrote The Waterclown – a musical setting of her epic poem about water issues, "The Waterclown" – for the Cleveland Chamber Symphony.

As the opening act for David Bowie on his 1990 Sound+Vision Tour US tour, Legere played her original songs for 20,000 people a night. A huge forklift brought a white grand piano to the stage, where she performed with her seminal punk-rock band, the Four Nurses of the Apocalypse.