Mandy Harris Williams
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# Biography / CV

# Biography

Mandy Harris Williams is a theorist, multimedia conceptual artist, writer, educator, radio host and internet/community academic. She is from New York City and currently lives in Los Angeles. Raised between the Upper West Side and Harlem, Mandy's work focuses on the tensions that unfold between 96th street and 125th. Privilege, dis privilege, and back again in 15 minutes churning underground. Mandy's work seeks to get everybody the love that they deserve. She focuses on desirability privilege as a real and mythological market and political force. She graduated from Harvard, having studied the History of the African Diaspora, as well as the mass incarceration crisis, and other contemporary black issues. She received her MA in Urban Education and worked as a classroom teacher for 7 years in low income communities. She integrates a holistic and didactic style in to her current creative practice. Her creative work has been presented at Paula Cooper Gallery, Institute of Contemporary Art Los Angeles, Art + Practice, Navel, Knockdown Center and Women's Center for Creative Work to name a few. She has a monthly radio show, the #BrownUpYourFeed Radio Hour, on NTS. She has contributed writing work to Dazed Magazine, MEL magazine, ForHarriet, and The Grio and is a frequent radio and podcast guest.

MANDY HARRIS WILLIAMS

B. 1988, New York, New York, Lives in Los Angeles, California

EDUCATION

2010 Bachelor of Science in History, Harvard University, Cambridge, Massachusetts

2012 Masters in Urban Education, Loyola Marymount University School of Education, Los Angeles, California

SELECTED EXHIBITIONS

2019 ICA LA (Special Project/ Installation): Raising My Voice, Los Angeles, California, February 2 - March 10

Art + Practice (Group Show): Time is Running Out of Time, Leimert Park, California, February 2 - September 14

2018 Shoot The Lobster (Collaborative Installation, Writer/Performer): The Worst Witch in collaboration with Devin Troy Strother and Alima Lee, Los Angeles, California, November 17 - February 17

Paula Cooper Gallery (Two-Person Show): Jonathan Borofsky, Mandy Harris Williams, New York, New York, February 13 - March 10

SELECTED LECTURES/ READINGS/WORKSHOPS

2019 University of Alaska, Fairbanks: “Brown Up Your Feed,” (Lecture), Fairbanks, Alaska, February 7

2018 Chroma, “Getting Fed by Your Feed,” (Workshop), New York, New York November 8

Ulises, “Getting Fed by Your Feed,” Dominica Publishing Closing, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, November 4

Yale Union, “Brown Up Your Feed,” facilitated by home school, Portland, Oregon, October 14

Knockdown Center, “Brown Up Your Feed,” Chroma Continuity Conference, New York, New York,

Navel: “A Brief History of Black People on Screen,” (Presentation), Hard to Read x Navel Presents Lovelace -- Book Release event for Claire Evans’ Broad Band, Los Angeles, California, March 16

Women’s Center for Creative Work: “Getting Fed by Your Feed”, Los Angeles, California, February 28

Cixous 72, Molasses Bookstore: Assorted Poems, New York, New York, February 11

The Standard, DTLA: “Reflections on Body Language,” Hard-to-Read, Los Angeles, California, January 23

2017 501(c)3 Foundation: Remarks for Premiere of NUII, a film by Item Idem, Los Angeles, California, January 20

SELECTED TALKS/PANELS

2019 Red Bull Music Festival: “Filmmakers Summer Mason and Kandis Williams, in Conversation with Mandy Harris Williams,” Moderator, Rhythm Frequencies Screening, Los Angeles, California, February 20

Sisters with Invoices: “Mandy Harris Williams and Alima Lee in Conversation with Amelian Kashiro Hamilton and Whitney Gibson,” Los Angeles, California, January 27

2018 The Standard, DTLA: Host/Curator “Pillow Talk: Music and Sexuality,” Los Angeles, California, September 27

Gavin Brown’s Enterprise, SHAKEDOWN: “Filmmaker Leilah Weinraub, in Conversation with Mandy Harris Williams,” New York, New York, September 22

SELECTED WRITING

2019 “BSFX: Black Special Effects,” Art Los Angeles Reader, 2-3, (2019)

2018 “#BrownUpYourGallery” vulture.com, (November 27), https://www.vulture.com/2018/11/how-to-brownupyourgallery.html

“Patrisse Khan Cullors” Dazed, 108-113, (Summer)

“Getting Fed From Your Feed,” (Pamphlet/Insert), Third Magazine

2017 “Goodbye to the Myths and Messiahs of Respectability,” Published by n0eg0

SELECTED SCREENINGS

2019 “On Matter(ing),” Writer/Theorist, ComposeLA Festival, Department of Cultural Affairs, February 13

2018 “Portals 1,” A Collaboration with Alima Lee, Screened at NOW Film Center, Highland Park, California (December 9), Abrons Art Center (October 5 – 27), Gavin Brown’s Enterprise, New York, New York (September 19)

SELECTED PRESS

2019 Artforum, The Worst Witch Review, (March)

AQNB Staff, “The Worst Witch,” Atractivo Que No Bello, (February 27) https://www.aqnb.com/2019/02/27/devin-troy-strother-at-shoot-the-lobster-los-angeles/

2018 Francesca Gavin, “The artist whose works are inspired by Instagram’s algorithm” Dazed, (February 19), http://www.dazeddigital.com/art-photography/article/39095/1/artist-mandy-harris-williams-works-are-inspired-by-instagram-s-algorithm

NPR, Marketplace with Kai Ryssdal, “Navigating Instagram’s Algorithm as @idealblackfemale,” (August 6), https://www.marketplace.org/2018/08/06/life/navigating-instagrams-algorithm-idealblackfemale

SELECTED RESIDENCIES

2018 Eyedream, By Us For Us Residency at Eyebeam, Brooklyn, New York, August 27 – September 2